office gossip

Office gossips is one of the strongest undercurrent that affects work productivity and can break goodwill among staff members working together. In a big corporation, this can build up to having factions and blocking cooperation between departments...office politics?!

It was refreshing to hear that whoever gossips or slanders another would be fired -- an office in England. Sometimes gossip can be caustic and contagious. Is there a difference between rant and gossip?

A gossip is talking behind someone's back in a facetious fashion. If this creates ill-will among staff members then it is legitimate as this definitely affects work productivity.

How does the boss manage this without infringing on one's right to talk or let off steam?

In its context, the boss will need to confront the person who has been gossiping or ranting about another and bring the respective parties together to iron out the issue in question. Let the two work out their differences. If one of the two continues, in the event, it is legitimate to fire the respective staff.

If the gossip is against the boss, then the staff ought to consider resigning if he/she did not work well under him -- rather than slandering.

breast cancer

It seems breast cancer is on the rise among women of every race in the world today. Why?

Is this the result of change in diet? It appears some women who migrated from Taiwan to the US, who in their elder years had been diagnosed with breast cancer. Is this because they ate more red meats as compared to the diet they grew up with -- more tofu and vegetables and less meat? Or vice versa when a caucasian young who changed to a tofu diet in coincidence died of breast cancer?

Migration? Stress? Women holding day jobs and taking care of the homes? Promiscuity? Free sex? Drugs?

Lacking in exercise? Leading too sedentary lives? Unlike yesteryears, women have to work very hard, lots of manual and menial tasks...

Unhappiness...psychological stress...divorce?

Or, are we too well educated that we see everything as symptom and therefore needing immediate attention whereas in the past, women might have lumps and conveniently dismissed that and were able to live longer lives? An elderly friend's mother shared that her grandmother had a lump in her breast and she went on to live to her ripe old age 80 or more...

These are some fleeting thoughts.