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(October 2023 update)

It seems, we will have to live with Covid 19 as an additional health threat here to stay. 2023 was very quiet in relation to the virus, and things feel almost ‘like before’. Every once in a while you hear of new infections, but the virus doesn’t seem to be as contagious as it was. Some changes in workplaces seem to have become more permanent. Office employees have returned to their offices at least for a few days a week, hybrid models and more flexibility seem to have become more common and Working from Home also seems to be here to stay. Since my class members are among those enjoying the flexibility of a hybrid working system, I am still mostly teaching online; and beginning to think whether I could become a digital nomad and work from a cottage at the coast or a tree house in the woods, or something like that – good internet connection provided.

I will retire my Viral Times and Useful Lesson Links to the page section as they still contain valuable material, links and topics. They also read like diaries of the last three years that I would not want to delete. I am glad I have this document of the past years as things feel like they have gone back to pre-pandemic times so quickly; except for some changes in our work lives I am not so sure where else major changes have been successful: hospital staff is still underpaid, blown-up SUVs are still invading our cities and environments. Air travel and cruises seem to have increased again, though I don’t know by how much, and the summers still seem to be getting hotter. So all in all not much has changed.

Or so it seems. Humans are slow to change things and our ability to do things in the present to have a different future is probably not in our nature. I have been watching and discussing Lisa Genova’s TED talk with many groups and one thing she says is that ‘prospective memory sucks’. We are not good at remembering the things we want to do in the future.

So not taking the car to the supermarket around the corner and walking instead might be more difficult to do than we think.

I have also been reading and discussing passages from Daniel Lieberman’s books Exercised and The Story of the Human Body and listening to an interview. Onestopenglish News Lessons provides one on 10 common health beliefs and if they are fact or myth.

On BBC Reel you find short videos on a great variety of topics. Some of my favorites are from the nutritionist Kimberly Wilson.

• Lieberman, Daniel (2013). The Story of the Human Body: Evolution, Health and Disease. Pantheon Press. ISBN 978-0307741806.

• Lieberman, Daniel (2021). Exercised: Why Something We Never Evolved to Do Is Healthy and Rewarding. Pantheon Press. ISBN 978-1524746988.