Gargh, this process is incredible, Suela.

On Katniss, I ruffled my feathers initially, and then I read the books. And she read totally white to me, so I stopped fussing.

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ita, you did that on purpose, didn't you?

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It could completely be my perception, of course, but it seems like so many more people are discovering a sensitivity to gluten than has been the case before now. I'm wondering if one of the causes isn't consistently stressed immune systems, and we're reaching the tipping point of being able to tolerate other stressors. Also, see: asthma.

One theory (which makes sense to me) is that wheat grown now has been specifically engineered (I was going to say "bred," but didn't want to make a pun) to have *much* higher levels of gluten than wheat from, say, 100 years ago. Or even 50.

Because gluten is what makes bread fluffy. And people love fluffy bread (hell, I do). So what's the easiest way to make fluffier bread that people will buy the hell out of? Wheat with more gluten.

So if our bodies could handle some amounts of gluten, we haven't adapted fast enough to the new super-gluten-y wheat. Add to that the fact that gluten is in goddamn everything -- flour is used as a thickener in soups, salad dressings, even ice cream, for god's sake -- and it's not only the exposure to super-gluten-y bread products, but the fact that it's everywhere, that creates that scenario where the body just can't handle that much gluten and finally gives up trying to deal.

(Granted, I have no idea how mass-produced, pre-packaged soups and salad dressings compare to those from, say, 1950. Commercially prepared soups and dressings might have had wheat as a thickener back then also. But in 2012 we eat a metric fuckton more processed foods than people did in 1950. So the overall cumulative exposure has skyrocketed.)

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Homemade soups use flour, too.

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This is sad and weird:

Teen girl dies after inhaling helium at party

Dr. Mark Morocco, associate professor of emergency medicine at the Ronald Reagan Medical Center in Los Angeles, said what happens is similar to when a scuba diver surfaces too quickly. A gas bubble gets into the bloodstream, perhaps through some kind of tear in a blood vessel. If it is a vein, the bubble will stay in the lungs. If it is an artery, it can block the flow of oxygen-laden blood to the brain, causing a stroke. If there is a hole in the heart, the bubble can go from a vein to an artery and then to the brain.

eta: Result of autopsy:

Immediate Cause of Death - “Traumatic helium gas and air embolism due to inhalation of helium gas mixture from a pressurized canister.”

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Dag, she was probably talking like Donald Duck when she died.

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Homemade soups use flour, too.

I'm not sure I've made soup from scratch, but wouldn't cornstarch or another starch (tapioca, arrowroot) work in flour's place?

I should try to make soup, but I just don't feel it. Maybe pumpkin bread.

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Dag, she was probably talking like Donald Duck when she died.

It sounds like she passed out seconds after inhaling the helium.

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I'm not sure I've made soup from scratch, but wouldn't cornstarch or another starch (tapioca, arrowroot) work in flour's place?

Oh, absolutely -- it's just not a new place for gluten to be, is all.

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it's just not a new place for gluten to be, is all.

Darn sneaky stuff.

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