2020 Life Logs, Day 59: Mt. Kilimanjaro
Date: Friday, February 28, 2020
Weather: Mostly Cloudy, Still Windy; High 37 degrees, Low 27 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA

No, I’m not planning to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro, but I recently met someone who is doing the final ascent to the summit tonight. When I got an email this morning announcing that, it piqued my curiosity and I decided to do a little reading about Kilimanjaro climbs. When I made my Voyage of Windbird presentation to the Bourne Newcomers Lunch and Learn Group, Donna Pascarella, the woman in charge of the event, invited her husband and brother to come. The three of them are leaving in September from Chicago to boat down the Mississippi to the Ohio to the Tennessee River and finally through a waterway that will bring them out into the Gulf of Mexico at Mobile, Alabama, and then on down to the Keys. The brother is the one climbing Kilimanjaro with his youngest son. After the presentation, I asked Donna to keep me posted on the Kilimanjaro climb, so this week she has been forwarding texts sent by her brother. I didn’t really expect to get the day by day account, but I have found it very interesting. What surprised me most was that I knew almost nothing about this mountain. I thought maybe it was the highest peak in Africa, but I didn’t know in what country. Google told me, “Renowned as the highest peak in Africa, Mount Kilimanjaro boats exclusive jaw-dropping sceneries, treacherous trails, and the infamous Barranco wall.” The piece I was reading went on to say that there are seven different routes to the top. I did not ask which route Donna’s brother was taking, but when he mentioned in a text earlier in the week that they had successfully climbed the Barranco wall, I looked that up. That narrowed the possibilities to four of routes and from my reading it seems the Lemosho route would be the safest bet for a successful climb to the top and it is also supposed to have the most beautiful path. I’ll be interested to find out which route they did take. And I’ll be sure and let you know if they made the summit.

I spent a good deal of today finishing the ‘just for fun’ book I have been reading so that I can do the reading for my next book club meeting. I have ten days to read The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead. On the back of the book, the first review written by Oprah says it kept her up at night reading. If I am going to finish it in time for the book club meeting, I think I will need to read into the nights as well. I’ll start tonight.

Every Friday I get an email from one of my health gurus, Dr. Mark Hyman, listing his five best picks of the week. Today one of those was a research report that outlines some preliminary suggestions for dosage levels of ‘nutraceuticals’, defined as pharmaceutical alternatives that I will just call supplements, that in the words of the research summary, “ . . . might be expected to be worthwhile for controlling RNA viruses.” RNA viruses include the flu and coronavirus. I am going to copy the list of these supplements as well as a link to the research report. It can’t hurt to have this information on hand. Some of the things on the list are things many people already take to avoid colds—zinc and elderberry. Copy this link to see the whole research paper or just look at the list of suggested supplements below.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0033062020300372?utm_source=Mark%27s+Picks&utm_campaign=836e435ca8-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_03_29_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_3eb7466668-836e435ca8-124384525&mc_cid=836e435ca8&mc_eid=18b3097ac1

Ferulic acid 500-1,000 mg
Lipoic acid 1,200-1,800 mg (in place of ferulic acid)
Spirulina 15 g (or 100 mg PCB)
N-Acetylcysteine 1,200–1,800 mg
Selenium 50-100 mcg
Glucosamine 3,000 mg or more
Zinc 30-50 mg
Yeast Beta-Glucan 250-500 mg
Elderberry 600–1,500 mg