Some days, her only goal was to take a shower.

I have an article on postpartum depression in the Winter 2007 issue of UPMC Health Journal. It's not available online, but you can read a scanned version here.

Excerpt:

As the door closed behind Janice's mother, who was heading home after helping to take care of Janice's first baby, Ethan, Janice had only one thought: What do I do now? The walls of the Staten Island apartment where she lived with her husband, Tom, seemed to close in. Although Tom did as much as he could, his job as a national park ranger meant he was often gone. Ethan had colic, and cried for what seemed like an eternity.

Janice felt all alone. She didn't know her neighbors very well. Tom was the extroverted one; she thought of herself as a shrinking violet. When she married him, she didn't know she'd be moving across the country and back again for his job--three times in less than a decade. ... The small-town Ohio girl was intimated by New York, which she found too urban, too expensive, too gray. ...

this weekend's events...

(Image: Black Tie Revue)








Tonight
9:30 pm
- The Cassettes w/ The Subjects & Black Tie Revue

EVENT TYPE: Music:Rock:Indie

The Cassettes: retro-minded indie from Washington DC
The Subjects: indie rock out of Brooklyn, NY
Black Tie Revue: Local favorites

WHEN: Thu Feb 22: 9:30PM

WHERE: brillobox
NEIGHBORHOOD: Lawrenceville
AGES: 21+

Saturday
6 pm
- AFRICAN DANCE, STORYTELLING AND SONG

In honor of Black History Month, the UPMC Office of Diversity is sponsoring a free public presentation, “Amandla! A Celebration of African Arts."

The final performance will be held at 6 p.m., Saturday, Feb. 24 in the Scaife Hall Auditorium, located at 3550 Terrace St., Oakland.

Masankho Banda, a performing artist and internationally recognized peace builder, will perform with a multicultural, intergenerational troupe of dancers, storytellers, drummers and singers at the event. Banda uses African dance, drumming, storytelling, song and the seven principles of Kwanzaa to inform audience members about the continent of Africa, the Caribbean diaspora, and the African experience in North America.

The American Cancer Society will host an African art show and sale at the event, featuring authentic African wood and stone carvings, among other items. In addition, Imagination Books will be on hand with merchandise related to black history and African culture.

All of the presentations are free and open to the public and no registration is necessary. For more information, please call the Office of Diversity at (412) 432-7284.

9 pm
- Global Beats presents...Carnival from Rio to Beijing!

EVENT TYPE: Music:World

A party so big we put the whole world in it!
Join us as we celebrate two extravagant events: Brazilian Mardi-Gras and the Chinese New Year.

Wear your mask or whatever floats your dragon boats!

Saturday, the 24th. You can find more information at www.arrepiabrasil.org.

At the AVA Lounge, 126 S. Highland Ave, East Liberty
Saturday, February 24th, starting at 9 PM
$5 cover

WHEN: Sat Feb 24: 10PM
IT'LL COST YOU: $5
AGES: 21+

10 pm
- Lohio CD release party

General Miggs, Skeletonbreath, lohio & Ennui more info
event type Music:Rock:Indie

General Miggs: indie rock from Brooklyn, NY
Skeletonbreath: progressive metal/indie from New York City
lohio: Local Favorites celebrating their CD Release!
Ennui: Melodic shoegazers from Pittsburgh

[side note: i am really excited to see ennui. i've wanted to ever since i heard their song on the 20/20 proof pittsburgh music comp.]

when
Sat Feb 24: 9:30PM

where
brillobox

neighborhood
Lawrenceville

ages
21+

--
for EVEN MORE EVENTS, check out thisishappening.com.

Another music sharing thing

I have just found lala.com, which is mind-boggling. You can get CDs for $1.75. How it works is: You put up a list of CDs you're willing to trade, and a list of discs you want. After that it's pretty much quid pro quo. They send you prepaid mailers, so you don't even have to go to the post office (much like Netflix). As you trade more CDs, you get more of the ones on your "Want" list sent to you.

Here's my page.

It makes me wish I still had all those CDs I got rid of back when I thought I was leaving Pittsburgh (ha!)

Interracial Marriages in Decline

This surprised me:

Inter-racial and inter-ethnic marriages are declining at unprecedented rates, according to a new study by Zhenchao Qian, a professor of sociology at Ohio State University, reports the Chinese-language World Journal. Qian conducted the study with Daniel Lichter, a professor at Cornell University and published the study in the February 2007 issue of the American Sociological Review.

Zhen said that immigration is an important factor in the decline of inter-racial marriages as native born Asian Americans and Hispanics marry their foreign-born counterparts. Among Asian immigrant men, inter-racial marriage declined from 26 percent in 1990 to 21 percent in 2000; among Asian immigrant women the percentage went from 41 percent in 1990 to 33 percent in 2000. The study showed that the percentage of interracial marriage in native-born Asian men have also declined from 50.2 percent in 1990 to 45.8 percent in 2000.

The only increase in inter-racial marriage was between American-born Asian women and non-Asian men, which increased from 58 percent to 60 percent. The study also showed that although inter-racial marriages of African Americans increased significantly in the 1990s, it is still fewer than other racial groups. The study suggests that people with higher education levels are more likely to marry outside of their race.

'The luck of the ugly'

I have a new translation posted at WatchingAmerica.com of a column in El Tiempo, a Colombian newspaper. The U.S. show "Ugly Betty," originally a Colombian telenovela, just won several Golden Globe awards, but some Colombians aren't too happy about it. In the American version, Betty is the daughter of a Mexican immigrant.

The newspaper El Espectador mentions that this new version of "Betty la Fea" will go a long way toward transcending United States immigration policies: to portray the conditions of immigrants in a soap opera followed by tens of millions of U.S. citizens would assure a change in mentality and relax the legal difficulties and daily treatment of "ugly Betties" that hold secondary positions in the great corporations in New York, Miami and San Francisco.

What emerges in this soap opera is, however, the irreconcilable differences between the Mexican immigrants and American tycoons. It's impossible that such mockery could lead to understanding.

And yet... the show is phenomenally popular worldwide. According to Wikipedia, the series has been adapted from Israel to India.

oh, my love, my darling...

the trunk reduction deluxe - from "the ballad of puchy delgado."

unchained.mp3