UomoNeroNero

"...a delicious traditional variation, typical for example of the town of Fuscaldo in Calabria, where small oily fish are layered with salt and whole black peppercorns, or prepared with black pepper and chili peppers..."

This is one of the most wonderful things about traditional Italian food: every town has its own version of almost everything. And, of course, everyone passionately defends the idea that theirs is the only truly authentic one, while all the others are inferior imitations. It's part of the fun.

Where I live, people actually go on "hunts" for great food. We make yearly trips just to buy a particular product because "only that place makes it perfectly." Then we bring it home, talk about it with family and friends, compare producers, debate which one is best... There's an entire culture built around the pursuit of exceptional food.

Salt-cured anchovies. They're not rotten at all—they're spectacular! They're perfect on pizza, with fresh tomatoes, and in countless other dishes, either rinsed straight from the jar or melted into a sauce while cooking.

Where I live (a small seaside town), everyone makes their own jars of salt-cured anchovies. They are traditionally sealed with a loose lid consisting of a slate disc with a stone or other weight on top. They need to mature while still being able to breathe, and they must always remain covered by the proper amount of salt.

(The way you describe yours—as extremely smelly and falling apart—doesn't really suggest they're high quality. Normally, a properly cured anchovy should remain almost completely intact, so you can remove the tail and backbone and end up with two whole fillets. The peppercorns are a bit unusual as well.)

yes, really.....

Yes. Really

As the saying goes, "The graves are full of hindsight."

In twenty years of living with diabetes, I've made an unbelievable number of mistakes — enough to fill a warehouse.

Every one of them became a lesson, provided it didn't kill me first.

One of the biggest lessons, in fact, was learning to be extremely organized and always prepared.

Yes, in that particular case I had already used up my supplies (and during a three-day trip I hadn't thought about bringing a refill), and, rather stupidly, I wasn't carrying glucagon with me.

I've never claimed to be smart — just a survivor of my own stupidity.

P.S.

As a European, I genuinely struggle to understand how you cope with your healthcare situation.

In France, in a small mountain village, I walked into a pharmacy and, through a combination of gestures and sketches, managed to buy a box of rapid-acting insulin at full price (around €30–40).

The insulin was clearly available. The issue was purely bureaucratic — technically I needed a prescription from a French doctor. But the urgency of the situation, and the fact that I was obviously diabetic, were equally obvious.

We certainly have our own problems over here, don't get me wrong.

But I don't envy yours.

Oh, and one more thing.

I always keep a blood glucose meter in my backpack. You know, that medieval-age stuff with the finger-pricker and test strips. (You can buy one for about €10 in pretty much any pharmacy in Europe, but it’s better to already have one with you.)

And pen needles, too.

Friend, you’re diabetic.

Your survival is ultimately your own responsibility. Prepare yourself for a few hard truths.

No one — including nurses and doctors who are not specifically trained in diabetes management — truly knows your situation.

I had a TIA. I was barely functioning, hospitalized, semi-conscious. Not a single person in the ER, nor during the entire week I was admitted, stopped to think that maybe I wasn’t mentally fit to manage my own CGM.

Always be prepared.

I once found myself in what my company had sold to me as a “hotel” in Germany. It was really more of a shack. I was having a severe hypo, glucose at 70 and dropping fast. There was no lobby, everything was closed, emergency services didn’t speak English, and I couldn’t even find a taxi willing to come out there.

I ended up licking sugar crumbs and biscuit dust that had accumulated over the years in the pocket of my suitcase.

Your CGM can fail. In fact, it will almost certainly fail while you’re on vacation on some Greek island with no signal.

You must know how to manage your blood sugar with insulin pens. Even with different insulin types. You need conversion charts. You need the phone number of your diabetes center so you can get proper instructions. You must be able to change an infusion set in the dark, slightly drunk, like Rambo — except this isn’t a movie.

You need to remember your insulin-to-carb ratio and be able to estimate the carbohydrates in a dish you’ve never seen before.

I’m lucky enough to be able to “feel” my blood sugar. More importantly, I can sense when I’m heading toward a hypo, and I do everything I can to preserve that personal superpower.

As we say in Italy, being diabetic is serious business.

My colleagues and friends see only the outside. They see a well-managed condition, an HbA1c of 6. They laugh when I tell some of the more extreme stories.

But they have no idea — absolutely no idea — how difficult our lives are.

Ours, and our families’.

I truly appreciate your work (and I’ll absolutely take a look at it).

But let me say one thing: I’ve been diabetic for more than 20 years. Ten years of management with finger pricks, three measurements a day, and insulin pens (thinking about it now, it feels completely insane that anyone could imagine managing this madness in such a primitive way). Then came years of CGM systems (I’m on my third one now, with different types of sensors, but that’s not the point).

I tinkered, automated, hacked things. But in the end I came to one conclusion: you need a competent specialist (someone who also understands that we tend to be a bit tech-obsessed) who, besides listening to you, actually imposes a strategy. We are the ones who need to adapt to the mainstream approach so we can speak the same language and have methods that are compatible with “everyone else.” No doctor will ever fully understand your custom system, and meanwhile the key to proper management is not in what you built.

Precise carb counting (without cheating yourself), correct boluses given at the right times, marking exercise, boredom and repetition, and being lucid about the effects of changes (agreed upon beforehand!) to CGM settings — changes that should only be made when you’re certain you’ve been a “good and precise patient.”

I’m saying this from the perspective of my own devastated situation. I now have an HbA1c of 5.8, but only after 20 years of smashing my head against the wall (and suffering incredible damage, many mistakes, and the classic “I’ve figured it all out myself” approach).

Stay strong.

I feel like a Neanderthal watching a sixteen-year-old fiddling around on a smartphone. Incredible. Maximum respect.

I donated blood for 25 years in Italy (I can’t anymore due to health reasons). Here we have a semi-public organization (AVIS - Italian Blood Volunteers Association) that handles donation and distribution. Zero stress, no “pushy” reminders, everything is completely voluntary. The trick is that by donating blood you receive your blood test results (a very comprehensive panel). It’s a mutually beneficial “do ut des” arrangement that is highly appreciated (and it helped me detect a serious issue at an early stage).

In addition, AVIS is a very community-oriented volunteer association that builds a sense of belonging and awareness.

Organized this way, the system works.

Mi hai fatto sentire molto vecchio. Grazie :-D

Well written. Shared with less technical colleagues. DNS witchcraft is never really understood — having a clearly written, understandable article is extremely useful.

I think it’s interesting to reconsider the idea of having floating widgets in an era of powerful CPUs/GPUs and multi-monitor setups. Personally, I love having my “widgets” active on the third monitor (the one I dedicate to “frivolous stuff” when I’m not drowning in open windows). I always keep two “old-school” draggable widgets active: a "macro keyboard shortcut remider" and a “diabetes monitoring dashboard” (unfortunately, that’s my cross to bear). I also always keep VLC running in a super-minimized state (web radio).

It seems to me like a smart way to always have certain “useful things” at hand. If I could achieve the final combo and get back an email ticket system identical to the one The Bat! provided 1000 years ago, I’d be really happy.

I love you.

Different — but driven by the same mindset, the same nonsense, and a system run by recycled old-guard politicians.

I was riding a Ducati Bravo!

This! Cazzo

I can guarantee you, from my personal experience of being diabetic for 30 years, that every day—and in the most incredible ways—I have managed to “almost kill myself.” Whether when I used finger-prick testing, sensors, injecting insulin with pens, or managing insulin with a pump. Our life is always a delicate balancing act between too little, too much, and way too much—the kind where this time I really kick the bucket

By personal choice I use a commercial CGM (if I could “touch it,” I’d be firmly on the side of certainty about killing myself through sheer stupidity), but reading something like “associated with” really makes me angry. Before making such subtle insinuations about the open-source world (the source of the revolution of the last 10 years in this field), regulatory bodies should open their eyes to what is actually happening with the quality of current sensors and the real problems they are causing.

I’ve been diabetic for 30 years, and for more than twenty of those I did multiple daily measurements by pricking my fingertips and multiple insulin injections per day. Now I wear a sensor that I replace every two weeks and a catheter (which I change about once a week).

I really don’t understand this phobia of needles at all. After two days with one system or the other, you get used to it—there’s no pain, it’s just a mental issue of “having to make the gesture.”

My friends used to laugh at how normal it was for me to inject insulin outside a restaurant, while walking, chatting, and smoking at the same time.

Ok. For once, I’m glad to be Italian :-D Here the national grid operator has installed smart meters. They support remote management of limits (maximum power in watts, tariffs, time-of-use tariffs), remote meter reading by the operator or local access plus an app, remote diagnostics, and simplified installation (strict rules and operator intervention, but in the end nothing particularly complex).

Belin ehh l’ho lasciato a casaaa

If you ever pass through Liguria, I can even treat you to a coffee. (But nothing more, eh! )

The wonderful feeling of walking into YOUR café, giving that special look to the barista, a smile, and he darts off at 100 km/h to make YOUR coffee (long, short, espresso, mochaccino) while he was already making a thousand others. In 3 seconds he already has YOUR favorite croissant in his hand, the water. “The usual?” You nod, smiling. A greeting glance to the regulars “of your hour.” Breakfast, you pay, you smile. If you have two minutes, you skim the newspaper while eating your croissant, because that’s just what you do, even if you already skimmed the news in a rush on the toilet on your phone. It’s a happy and friendly way to start the active part of the day. To feel like you’re part of your community. I love it — no vending machine or Starbucks can ever match it.

I love it too!!

I don’t know how to express to you how stupid, inadequate, and envious I feel of this level of competence. For me this article has the density of slaps of a plutonium ingot. It’s moving to read (and “maybe” understand, given how well it’s written). Wow, maximum respect, truly.

Mia nonna si ribalta nella tomba a leggere questa eresia! :-)

Bravo. * set your timer for a minute less than the cooking time on the box, check for doneness, then give it another minute if needed

Please eat the pasta al dente. Overcooked pasta is really awful, trust me

I’m Italian, and I really struggle to rationalize this attitude. I honestly don’t understand. Maybe it’s because I’m surrounded by 2,500 years of art in which nudity is an essential and predominant element, by people (even in the workplace) who have a relaxed and genuinely democratic view of the subject — but this comment feels totally alien to me. I suppose it’s my own limitation, but I would NEVER have focused attention on this aspect. I don’t know, maybe I’m the one who’s wrong…

This is the really interesting Thing!!!! And: how they can have different ROM content (code) for each chip