The Mean Waitress

Last night, I went to Lir with a group of friends. Although it was crowded and uncomfortably hot, we nabbed a big table in the front window so we decided to stay. Right from the start, our waitress was downright mean. Like, high school bitch mean. She acted like she was doing us a favor by taking our order, and did it in a really rude manner: rolling her eyes and saying "Tell me your drink order right now because it's a pain to get to this table."

Then, when our food came out, she brought the plates over to me and said: "You pass these out." and started handing me the plates one by one, and loudly said to another waiter "I'm really mean tonight." Yeah, no shit.

Having waitressed for many years, I am normally sympathetic to servers. All you have to do is smile and say something like "Sorry, it's really busy in here tonight." if you're not doing a good job. I am also normally a good tipper. 20% in general, 25% for very good service, and 15% if the service is lousy. Usually, bad service means they forget to bring your drink, or the food orders get messed up, or you have to wait a long time, and not open rudeness. We left her an 11% tip and I included a note:

"We're all former servers and would have given a great tip if you weren't openly hostile. I hope your night gets better."

I felt a little bit guilty about it later. And also a little bit like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman when she pulls the whole "Big mistake! Huge!" thing on the snobby salespeople. What do you think? Too harsh, or deserved? Regardless, I'll never go to Lir again. They must pool their tips, otherwise that girl would never make any money.

Celtics trade for Ray Allen

Draft Day Drama: Celtics pick up Ray Allen for Delonte West, Wally Szczerbiak, and the number 5 pick.

I like the move. With so many young players on the team, getting a proven veteran is much better than acquiring another developing talent. They didn't give up much, either. Wally's decent, but the only reason Delonte got the minutes he did is that the Atlantic Division sucks so bad. Poor kid's going to get eaten alive in the West. Provided that he stays healthy, Ray Allen automatically makes the Celtics a playoff contender next season, and, for that reason, the move probably satisfied Pierce.

An intriguing thought is that the Celtics still have Al Jefferson and Theo Ratliff's expiring contract as bait. Now that they've picked up Ray Allen, I wonder if they're trying to deal for another NBA veteran.

Not much to say

I haven't been all that inspired to post lately, because I'm having a very grad-studenty week. For example, yesterday, I worked in the lab for about ten hours, went home, ate a box of frozen green been casserole for dinner (it was disgusting, in case you're wondering), drank a beer by myself, and then went back to the lab to finish an experiment, which didn't even work. It's been like that all week.

Blah.

(Apologies for the whining. I'll write something better tomorrow, maybe about the NBA draft or the monster trade I'm hoing the Celtics will make sometime today.)

Quiz

Which Superhero are you?

I'm the Hulk.

My new favorite band

I just discovered a band called The Heartless Bastards . They're a bluesy rock trio from Ohio with a female lead singer. I love their name and I LOVE their music.

Take a listen: All This Time, by The Heartless Bastards

It's hot at Hades in Boston today.

Weekend Report

Friday- I spend the night alone with a sweet and adorable Spaniard. Here he is:

Saturday- A friend from college, Joe, popped into the city and Ern, Pat and I spent the day with him enjoying the sunshine and some of Southie's scenic locales. We had lunch at The Daily Catch, where the food and the view (see left) are excellent, but our waiter was terrible. After walking along the Harborwalk, we stopped by the Dorchester Height monument, about which a scary man once said to me "there's nothing to do up there except bury guns." We didn't find any buried weapons, but Joe did get electrocuted. Or at least pretended to. After discovering that Joe had never heard of candlepin bowling (or, "bowling"), we decided to bowl a few strings at the local lanes on East Broadway, thus completing the tour of Southie. Saturday night I attended a goodbye party for my friend Maria Jose, who is moving back to Spain this week.

Sunday- After consuming too much sangria at the depsedida, I woke up on Carolina's fold-out bed. Since the weather was so nice, we decided to go to the beach and drove up to Manchester-By-The-Sea on the North shore. Beautiful day, freezing water. We had a late lunch, and I continued onward to Framingham for dinner with my parents. I think one of the benefits of living in a place with unpredictable and frequently lousy weather is that one gains a true appreciation of the nice days, especially when they come on weekends.

My eyes! They burn!

Here's a photo that should be added to the Top 15 Most Embarassing Photos of President Bush:























Crocs with socks? OMG BARF! Will those ugly shoes just go away and die, please?

(list via Kevin, photo via Jaynie)

In Rod We Trust

Rod Stewart recently married for the third time, to a blonde model (suprise!).

Some of you who knew me in college may have fond memories of the Rod Stewart Party, a.k.a The Best Party Ever Thrown. At some point during college, a few friends discovered out that we shared a common secret love of Rod Stewart. Yes, he's gotten a tad cheeseball in recent years, but he's still awesome. Don't believe me? Take a listen, or right click and save:

Stay With Me

Anwyays, during our last semester, we were thrilled to learn that he was coming to South Bend for a concert. However, being broke college students, we couldn't afford the tickets and opted instead to throw a Rod Stewart party on the front lawn of our townhouse. My friend Mary and I got out of class in the early afternoon and hung a giant "Welcome Rod" banner across the front of the house, and Mary ran out to the store to pick up a Rod CD. When she returned, she told me "I couldn't decide which one to buy, so I got all four." We loaded them into a multi-disc CD player, turned it up, cracked some Bud Lights, and spent the next, oh, eight hours or so sitting on our lawn, eventually joined by a large group of friends and neighbors, in a boisterous tribute to a British legend. Rod Bless America.

Movie Review: Once

Last night, Carolina and I watched Once, twice. Well, we got to the cinema a couple of minutes after showtime, thinking that the previews would still be going, but the movie had already started. We figured that we had only missed a minute or two, so settled in and started watching. Then, about forty minutes later, the movie suddenly ended. We were very perplexed until we questioned some other moviegoers and discovered that Once was playing in two separate theaters, and we had walked into the wrong one and missed the first hour of the film. Luckily, another showing started almost immediately afterwards, so we stayed and watched the entire movie, even though we already knew the ending.
The movie itself is great. It's a low-budget, independent, musical film from Ireland- however, it's not a musical in the campy singing dialogue sort of way, rather, it's a film about an Irish street musician/vacuum repairman who meets and endearing Czech immigrant, who just so happens to sing and play piano. They round up a few more oddballs, form a band, get a loan from a bank, and spend a weekend recording an album together. It's a simple plot, and the two leads connect in a haphazard but touching manner reminiscent of Before Sunrise or Lost in Translation. Plus, they really are musicians: Glen Hansard of the The Frames and singer-songwriter Marketa Irglova. The music and the story rise above the shoddy lighting and the thick accents to form a simple and lovely film.

Give 'em and inch and they'll take a kilometer.

Here's a map of countries who do not use the metric system.

But hey, at least we don't weigh ourselves in stones like those freaky Brits.

(via Freakgirl)

Last Day in Louisville

The exams have all been graded and I fly home early tomorrow morning. Yipeee! It's been pretty fun hanging out in Louisville with my sister and her friends, and it's always nice to earn some extra cash, but I'm ready to get home, and damn am I tired of reading essays about cephalization.

This morning, I won a road race for the first time. Granted, it was a 2 mile race against a bunch of biology teachers, but I'll take whatever victories I can get.

In closing, here's my favorite sign from the week:

Maybe Fantasia was big in the Iron Age

Scientists in Sweden recently unearthed a bronze brooch with an uncanny similarity to Mickey Mouse. It's dated to 900 A.D. and supposedly represents a Lion, not the Disney mascot.

via Boing Boing

Weekend Report

So, I'm still in Louisville grading AP exams, so the actual grading took up most of the weekend.

Friday- I went to Churchill Downs with Kerry and a bunch of her teacher friends, plus a college pal of hers who's from Louisville. Loved it! Since it wasn't a premiere race day, it only cost $2 to get in and we sat right in front of the finish line. I placed a bunch of small bets and won once, on a horse named Magnificent Ravi.

Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, so I didn't get any good pictures of the races but Kerry took one on my phone of me enjoying a mint julep. Those motherfuckers pack a punch. I renamed the drink "the bourbon mojito" but I don't think it will catch on.

Saturday- Kerry invited me out to dinner with her and "some ladies." I accepted, although I was intrigued by her use of the relatively formal term "ladies." As it turns out, our dinner companions were indeed ladies- three Southern women in their 70s, driving a Town Car. They turned out to be highly entertaining, and we had a delicious dinner at Amici and then cruised around in the Town Car, checking out gorgeous home in "largest contiguous collection of Victorian Homes in the United States." (Who knew?) Not my typical Saturday evening entertainment, but fun, nonetheless.

Sunday- More grading, and I'm off to dinner at a brewpub with Kerry's gang of married male teachers.

And in case you haven't had enough of them yet, more quotes from the AP Bio exam:

• Other organisms, such as spiders, have senses which we do not possess. They have the ability to sense when they are being watched.
• Before the localization of sensory organs, animals possessed randomly strewn organs around their bodies.
• The first phyla noted for their cephalization are the mollusks, most notably squid, octopus, and cuddlefish.
• As it is really challenging to walk on two feet, men and women needed a nervous system because they were falling all over the place.
• Cephalization came after the anus was created and made animals move on to bigger and better things.

and my all-time favorite....

• Cephalization started with the formation of the hollow nerd cord.

Congratulations, San Antonio

The Spurs captured their 4th NBA title last night, sweeping Cleveland and providing evidence that the disparity between the Eastern and Western Conferences is akin to JV- Varisty these days. I lost interest in the playoffs after the Suns- Spurs series (a.k.a The Real NBA Final), but I did catch last night's game. LeBron had a great playoff run (hey, did you guys know that his girlfriend just had a baby? No kidding! Wow! You'd think they would have mentioned that during the broadcast.) but does need some more support. I'm happy that Tony Parker won the MVP- Duncan's obviously a stellar player, but a couple of years ago, I saw the Spurs completely dismantle the Celtics at the new Garden and walked away from it very impressed by Parker's play. Maybe because the C's haven't had a decent point guard in years. Plus, in addition to my Posada voice, I've created a new Tony Parker voice with a heavy French accent. He doesn't seem to have any accent whatsoever, but I'm convinced he masks it during interviews. "Eva, ma chérie, I am zee MVP!"

The New Seven Wonders

Kevin and Karen, the intrepid travelers, have a post up about the election of the New Seven Wonders of the World. Since only one of the Ancient Wonders still exists (hint: it's not the hanging gardens of Babylon), a Swiss Entrepreneur has begun a campaign to choose seven new ones. Check out Kevin's post for the details- I'm far too lazy to plagiarize them from him.

Voting ends on July 6, so the new 7 wonders will be named on 7/7/07. Of the 21 finalists, I have only seen three of them: the Eiffel Tower, Chichen Itza, and the Statue of Liberty.

I voted for seven that I have never seen, but always wanted to:

1. The Colosseum, Rome, Italy
2. Stonehenge, England
3. The Great Wall of China, China
4. Taj Mahal, Agra, India
5. Christ the Redeemer Statue, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
6. Easter Island Statues, Chile
7. Machu Picchu, Peru

What you don't know about cephalization

More quotes from the AP Bio Exam:

• It is so complex that my brain hurts just writing about how complex the brain really is.
• Our body is pretty complex but at the same time it's simple.
• Just like the human brain works the animal brain works, but maybe a little different.
• Cephalization is the act of cephalizing, which comes from the word cephalis, not to be confused with its neighboring term, syphilis.

In other news, my friend Allison randomly discovered that a band we both like, The Be Good Tanyas, was performing last night in Louisville. I went to see them, and I've never been to a concert by myself so I was worried that I'd feel totally lame, but it wasn't a big deal. Turns out they were playing in a church auditorium that seats around 400 people, and I obtained a spot in the 7th row in front of the stage, surrounded by middle-aged Christians. The show was great! They're a Canadian bluegrass trio of girls who play various stringed instruments (guitar, banjo, etc.) and sing, backed up by a male drummer and stand up bass player. I love their music, especially when Frazey Ford sings lead. She has a rich, smooth voice, sort of like Norah Jones or Natalie Merchant. Overall, they're sort of like the Canadian version of the Dixie Chicks minus the perkiness and plus a blues singer. I did think their stage presence could use a little work- I'm guessing that a stage at a church auditorium isn't their usual venue, but they were constantly asking the sound guy to make adjustments, and they looked pretty uncomfortable and stressed out and didn't seem like they were having much fun. Nevertheless, they won everyone over with their amazing music, and they did loosen up about halfway through the set and made fun of themselves for being so neurotic about the sound. Oh, and I couldn't even take any pictures because my stupid camera ran out of batteries. I did post one of their songs a while back in case you want to download it and check them out.

Nymph glands

Former Red Sox 2004 World Champions: Where Are They Now?




Last night, I attended a minor league baseball game and spotted a familiar name on the Louisville Bats roster: Mark Bellhorn. No longer sporting hockey hair, he now is a DH in the minor leagues. Part of me wonders why he doesn't give it up and make money signing baseball paraphernalia, but hey, maybe he's doing it For The Love of the Game.





In addition to learning about Bellhorn's current whereabouts, I also discovered what happens when you take a woman whose spent the past three years either pregnant or breastfeeding and let her loose in a strange city with cheap beer. I give you, my sister Kerry:






Note: This picture was taken before she drank three giant beers, spilled a fourth one (on a family), and loudly shouted the F word. Fun times!








As for the grading, here are some gems from today's answers, in addition to the mentioning of the "nymph glands":

• Millions of years ago homo sapiens had heads that were placed in front of their bodies. Today, however, our heads are placed directly on top of our heads.
• Cephalization is important in evolution. For example, think of our forefathers Adam and Eve. If Eve had a bigger brain, she would have resisted the devil and not taken the apple, avoiding all of the trouble that followed. This is an example of evolution.

Prenuptial Soup

Greetings from Louisville, which I still can't pronounce correctly - it sounds like someone mumbling Louaville. Here are some highlights (and lowlights) of the trip so far:

1. I got to use my laptop bag for the first time. It's pink and shiny and I bought it for $15 at the mall. Yes, slightly ridiculous, but I love it. My roommate Ern HATES it. It offends her with its lack of blackness. But guess who else loves it? EVERYONE! You'd think it was a puppy by the amount of attention it attracted. Security guards and airport personnel were complimenting it all day, and a man chased me down to ask me where I bought it because his wife liked it.

2. The hotel is really nice.

3. The food is lousy.

4. After a morning training session, they divided the readers into table groups, where we will be spending the next 6 full days grading exam questions. I am the youngest person by about 20 years in my group. When we introduced ourselves, we all said where we were from, what we taught, and what was our biggest accomplishment in the past year. Everyone else had touching stories about their children graduating from college, birth of a first grandchild, blah blah blah, and then I wowed them with "I bounced a check and gave myself a black eye in the same month!" (Just kidding. I mean, I did actually do that, but I didn't tell my table.)

5. My "reading buddy" has a terrible cold and is constantly coughing and blowing her nose, and in the process accumulating a pile of used tissues that resides way too close to my elbow for comfort.

5. As for the work itself, there are a lot of bad answers to the question that I'm correcting. However, bad can sometimes be funny. Like this statement, about the evolutionary significance of cephalization: "the first cells evolved from prenuptial soup."

Um...I believe the student meant "primordial soup" and was not referring to the first course of a rehearsal dinner. Ba-dum-bum. I'll be here all week. No really, I will.

6. Off to see a minor league baseball game tonight- the Louisville Bats! (named for the Louisville Slugger, the official bat of the MLB.)

7. Trivia question for you guys: what legendary athlete is from Louisville?

Kentucky Bound

I'm headed to Louisville, Kentucky today with my sister Kerry and a couple of her teacher friends, where, in between bourbon tasting and horse races, we'll be grading AP Exams. I'm a reader for the AP Biology exam, and unfortunately, I was assigned one of the more boring topics: cephalization. So, yes, for the next eight days, I'll be correcting the same question on the development of the brain and head. Oh well, at least I didn't get the one on desert plants.

I expect to post as normal, perhaps even more frequently- I know I've been slacking a bit lately.

Really Busy Weekend Report

Friday- We had a party at Lir to celebrate my roomate Ern's recent graduation from law school, in addition to her upcoming 30th birthday. So much fun! Her brother and I found all sorts of embarrassing photos to use for decorations, which Ern loved, and Timm had also designed some awesome t-shirts with her picture on the front. In case you're wondering, A-Face is an abbreviation for "Assface," a term of endearment that we like to call Ern. When ordering the cake, Timm didn't feel like getting into the whole explanation of A-Face with the middle-aged bakerwoman, so he told her that it was for his friend Aface, pronounced to rhyme with "Apache." Of course, nothing that I plan is complete without some sort of glitch, and there was one small error on my part. I bought a bunch of streamers, party props, and a happy birthday banner and handed them off to Timm before heading back to my apartment to get ready with Ern for the party. When we arrived to Lir, Timm asked "Did you do this on purpose?"

Me: "Do what on purpose?"

He points to the banner:

that says HAPPY RETIREMENT.

Much later in the evening, the letters were rearranged to spell HAPPY TERMITE ERN.

All in all, a very fun evening. Some pictures:

Saturday- Another day packed with more important events. In the morning, I attended the christening of my niece Maggie. An adorable little old Irish man performed the ceremony, and I did feel a tinge of good ole Catholic guilt about the fact that I don't really go to church anymore, but, oh well, I'm sure that's one of the least of my sins. We all headed out to lunch after the ceremony, and from there, my sister, cousins and I rushed around Framingham and Natick in preparation for my mother's 60th birthday. We threw her a surprise party at Molly Malone's in the Sheraton Tara hotel and had about 60 guests arriving. The plan worked out perfectly- the baptism was a perfect excuse for my sister Eri to be in town from California, and my mother looked stunned to walk in and see a large crowd of her family, friends, and colleagues. Here I am with my mom:

Everyone seemed to have a great time, and it was nice to catch up with the hometown crowd. We had a very townie evening, when after the party, Eri and I headed out with the Mulvey boys to the Tin Alley Grill, a restaurant where we both waitressed when we were younger. We stumbled upon a very surreal karaoke night, with a crowd so bizarre that Chris commented that he felt like we were in a David Lynch movie: local college students, aspiring rap stars, sketchy looking old people, and a dude with a cowboy hat, cane, and terrible voice, which he utilized to sing two of the longest songs in existence- "American Pie" and "Stairway to Heaven." Seriously, who karaokes to Stairway? I joked that they needed to install one of those No Stairway To Heaven signs from Wayne's World. I took some photos, but they don't even come close to capturing the weirdness. Eri and I brought down the house with our rendition of Kenny Rogers' "The Gambler."

Sunday- Spent the day visiting family, including my two nieces. Gaze upon their cuteness!

List #35....My Brilliant Money-Making Ideas

Okay, everyone, I probably shouldn't share these with the internets, but over the years, I've come up with several Brilliant Ideas. They may seem a bit far fetched, and one is entirely illegal, but all four have success written all over them.

1. Dunkin' Donuts Coffee Table Book. I will take candid photos all over Boston of Bostonians drinking Dunkin' Donuts coffee. Construction workers, businesswomen, students, policemen, you name it. I will then assemble the photos into a coffee table book. Think about it- wouldn't you buy this? I would. Either for myself of for another Starbucks eschewer. It would make a great gift. I bet Dunkin' Donuts would even sponsor this idea.

2. Dead Umbrella Coffee Table Book. Have you even noticed that after a windy rainstorm, the city is often littered with damaged umbrellas? Torn fabric, spokes akimbo, tossed by the wayside by their frustrated former owners. I don't know why, but I love them. I have already begun photographing them. This isn't quite the shoe-in as the DD book, but I bet I'm not the only one who finds amusement in dead umbrellas. Or maybe I'm alone here?

3. Motorcycle Thievery. I've always wondered why motorcycles don't get stolen more frequently. Here's my scheme. I'll buy a big old moving truck and hire a crew of burly men. It'll be a grab and run operation- we'll strike under cover of darkness, driving around the city and snatching up motorcycles, loading them into the back of the truck. Then, we'll drive a couple of states away and sell them on the black market. Assuming that there is a black market for motorcycles. Guaranteed money-maker.

4. Baseball Cultural Liaison. The Red Sox have a lot of players from Latin American countries on their roster. Shouldn't they hire someone to help new players with the transition to Boston? ....someone who speaks Spanish.....someone who is from the area.....hey, I know someone who would be perfect for the job. Me! I could act as a translator/guide/assistant. I've always thought that the whole "Manny being Manny" thing stems from the fact that he doesn't seem to be completely comfortable speaking English, and what is sometimes interpreted as goofiness and spaciness is actually more like shyness. I could help him out with that. "Don't listen to Señor Shaughnessy, Manny!" Maybe I should work on my Japanese to improve my versatility.

Don't even think of stealing my ideas, dear readers, and if you ever hear about a rash of motorcycle thefts in the Hub, well, mum's the word.

Interspecies friendship alert!

Meg sent me a link to this story: Baby crane and tiger cubs play together. Awwww....


Unrelated, but still newsworthy- a Polish man wakes up after 19 years in a coma. Wow!

Weekend Report

Friday- Went over Kim and Mike's to visit them and their baby. We rented Music and Lyrics, the latest Rom Com starring Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore. It was so-so...much better than the last Rom Com Kim and I rented (my Super Ex-Girlfriend, which sucked), but not as good as The Holiday.

Saturday- Busy day. Went to a bridal shower/cookout for some science friends in Worcester. Played soccer. Attended Maria and Jamie's second annual Crawfish Boil. Ate lots of crustaceans and drank too many hurricaines. So fun! Watched LeBron take the Cavs to the NBA finals. I'll post pictures soon. Of the crawish boil, not LeBron.

Sunday- Hit my second bridal shower of the weekend, worked, visited with the family, watched a lousy Red Sox game. Well, the game wasn't lousy, just the outcome. Although I did get to see my roommate Ern sitting in the front row, getting rained upon.

Hog wild

Last week, I noticed that a story entitled Boy bags hog said bigger than 'Hogzilla' kept appearing on Boston.com's most e-mailed articles. The headline didn't really grab my attention, but after seeing it listed for several days in a row, my curiosity got the best of me and I clicked on the link.

And then I saw the picture.....

I think a more appropriate headline would have been something like "HOLY FUCKING SHIT! Boy Kills Grotesque, Enormous Hog of Nightmares."

UPDATE! The hog wasn't wild after all.

What tarot card are you?

You are The Star

Hope, expectation, Bright promises.

The Star is one of the great cards of faith, dreams realised

The Star is a card that looks to the future. It does not predict any immediate or powerful change, but it does predict hope and healing. This card suggests clarity of vision, spiritual insight. And, most importantly, that unexpected help will be coming, with water to quench your thirst, with a guiding light to the future. They might say you're a dreamer, but you're not the only one.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

The Tuberuclosis Traveler

I'm sure many of you have heard about Andrew Speaker, the Atlanta lawyer who is positive with a multi-drug resistant strain of tuberculosis and is currently quarantined after disobeying authorities and taking several international flights. As you some of you know, I am getting a Ph.D. in microbiology, specializing in bacterial pathogens. Although I do not work on Mycobacterium tuberculosis, it is one of my favorites. Okay, "favorites" isn't quite the right term....let's just say that it is an important organism that is a major cause of disease worldwide:
currently, 1/3 of the world's population is infected with tuberculosis, with the vast majority of cases occurring in poor countries.

I'm pretty surprised that this story has generated so much press, but there are several intriguing aspects to it. First off, he's the first person to be forcibly quarantined in over forty years.

The man told the Journal-Constitution he was in Rome during his honeymoon when the CDC told him to turn himself in to Italian authorities to be isolated and be treated. The CDC told him he couldn't fly aboard commercial airliners. "I thought to myself: You're nuts. I wasn't going to do that. They told me I had been put on the no-fly list and my passport was flagged," the man said. He told the paper he and his wife decided to sneak back into the U.S. via Canada. He said he voluntarily went to a New York hospital, then was flown by the CDC to Atlanta. "I'm a very well-educated, successful, intelligent person," he told the paper. "This is insane to me that I have an armed guard outside my door when I've cooperated with everything other than the whole solitary-confinement-in-Italy thing."

Um, hello moron, you didn't cooperate at all! You did exactly everything that the authorities told you NOT TO DO!

Secondly, how the hell did this guy get TB? It is extremely rare for a healthy American to contract tuberculosis, let alone one of the multiresistant strains. His father-in-law is a microbiologist at the CDC, who just so happens to study tuberculosis. Although it is an odd coincidence, I think it's highly unlikely he contracted it from his father-in-law's lab, and that possibility should be easy to rule out by genotyping the strain.

Oh yeah, and the border guard who let him back in the U.S. saw the warning and ignored it because he "seemed perfectly healthy."

Honestly, I think the incident has been blown out of proportion- the fellow passengers are at minimal risk from contracting TB. First of all, the reason why it's a problem in poor countries is that unhealthy, malnourished, and immunocompromised people are the type who are likely to contract TB. They are not, however, the type of people who can afford international flights. Secondly, it appears that Speaker does not have active disease- the kind that leads to coughing and bacteria-spewing. However, maybe this news story will make the first world more aware of tuberculosis and the public health problem it poses, ideally leading to increases in funding for research on treatment and prevention.