SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) – Crashing machines, slow boot times, and agony dealing with technical support have Digital Age people suffering from Computer Stress Syndrome, a study available online Tuesday found.

"Today's digitally-dependent consumers are increasingly overwhelmed and upset with technical glitches and problems in their daily lives," a communications industry think tank said in a report entitled "Combating Computer Stress Syndrome."

The report identified sources of peoples' pain as "frustrating, complex computers and devices, technical failures, viral infections, and long waits to resolve support issues."

Findings were based on a survey of more than 1,000 people in North America by a Customer Experience Board created by the Chief Marketing Officer Council to look into how to keep customers happy in the highly competitive communications sector.

"The reality is that numerous, persistent problems are troubling most computer users, creating unnecessary anguish and anxiety as a result," the study found.

"Digitally dependent users are getting fed up and frustrated with the current state of computer related stress, and clearly looking for a better way to address and reduce it."

Full story here.

Haha. I just had to laugh as I read this news story especially the comments left by the readers at the Yahoo news site. I can really identify with tech trouble related stress!

One commenter at the news site suggested, and I completely agree, the problem is mostly this: It's called something isn't going your way and it's stressing you out.

Last weekend, my iPhone crashed. I was in a hotel room with no access to the internet, and I could not restore the phone to its original settings. I was cussing and grumbling the whole weekend about the "stupid" phone.

I borrowed my husband's iPhone and read whatever I could about finding solutions to the problem with the phone. Previously, I had cleverly followed all the instructions on how to jailbreak and unlock the phone, and restoring the iPhone to its original settings was going to make all my hard work disappear, not to mention the non-Apple applications that I had installed on the iPhone! That was added stress!

So are there better ways to address and reduce tech trouble related stress?

How about using less of the computer and any tech related gadget? A little hard when our life has become so dependent on these gadgets!

How about making better products that won't fail on us that frequently? Huh?

How about making tech support more friendly and more efficient? The kind that is available 24/7 and at our whim and fancy?

Thank goodness, the iPhone was the only tech trouble I had to deal with in a long time, and the trouble with it wasn't that difficult to resolve. I did not have to call any kind of tech support.

CHICAGO – Four common bad habits combined — smoking, drinking too much, inactivity and poor diet — can age you by 12 years, sobering new research suggests.

The findings are from a study that tracked nearly 5,000 British adults for 20 years, and they highlight yet another reason to adopt a healthier lifestyle.

Overall, 314 people studied had all four unhealthy behaviors. Among them, 91 died during the study, or 29 percent. Among the 387 healthiest people with none of the four habits, only 32 died, or about 8 percent.

The risky behaviors were: smoking tobacco; downing more than three alcoholic drinks per day for men and more than two daily for women; getting less than two hours of physical activity per week; and eating fruits and vegetables fewer than three times daily.

These habits combined substantially increased the risk of death and made people who engaged in them seem 12 years older than people in the healthiest group, said lead researcher Elisabeth Kvaavik of the University of Oslo.

The study appears in Monday's Archives of Internal Medicine.

Full story here.

Do I really need a study to tell me that bad habits can make you age faster?

I can see with my own eyes what smoking, too much alcohol and a sedentary lifestyle can do to a person's appearance!

It is worse in women! I have friends who smoke, and boy, do they look older than their age - the wrinkles on their face, way to much for their age, and their grandmotherly voice because of the smoking.

But then again, even without these bad habits, if you happen to possess genes that make you look older than your real age, you really are out of luck!

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of VitaDigest. All opinions are 100% mine.

Today, I came across an article from HealthDay News about how "selenium can help reset a cell's biological clock (circadian rhythm) after it has been thrown off by cancer-causing chemicals". I used to take selenium supplement and this positive news has renewed my interest in it.

I can't remember why I felt the need to take selenium in the past, but today's news about how disruption of the circadian rhythm can increase the risk of mammary cancer and how a simple dietary supplement like selenium can reverse this effect by restoring rhythm and reducing cancer incidence, is enough reason to start taking selenium again!

I am already taking vitamin B-12, magnesium, flax seed oil and evening primrose oil because I am experiencing peri-menopausal symptoms and these supplements are supposed to be beneficial in easing some of the symptoms like forgetfulness, fatigue and hot flashes.

I am happy to note that selenium supplement is available from VitaDigest, as well as the other supplements that I am taking. In fact, it offers over 13,000 vitamins, supplements, and other health products. That practically means anything you are looking for with regards to vitamins, supplements and health products can be found here. In fact, VitaDigest.com was awarded INC5000 for 2009 for being one of the top 5000 fastest growing company. Quite an achievement indeed!

Now, who doesn't like free shipping when ordering online? VitaDigest offers FREE shipping on all orders over $100! If you use coupon code “izb10jan” on your order today, you will get a 10% off which is good till the end of February! How's that for savings, eh?

I received a catalog from Amazon in the mail yesterday. I did not know that Amazon even bothered with catalogs!

I do a lot of shopping at Amazon. The only thing is, my shopping is mostly limited to the electronics department and the books department! I did buy a pair of boots in the shoe department one winter and that was it!

In the catalog that came in the mail yesterday, there were various cards with scents of the perfume that were being promoted. Oooooohhhh, everything smelled heavenly! I love perfumes! Maybe I should check out the deals on perfumes at Amazon!

Even though I love perfumes, I always want to get the best price before I buy any. Where can you get the best price other than at the duty free shops at international airports?! I never fail to buy a bottle (usually the largest bottle) of perfume every time I travel internationally.

But where do I go to compare the duty free prices against those at Amazon? Until I can be sure that Amazon prices are comparable to the prices at the duty free shops, I will hold off any perfume purchase from Amazon!

I just had a dinner of stir fried asparagus with shrimp. I love asparagus but I cannot eat it often. I found that twice a week of asparagus can cause pain in my joints especially in one of my hands. I can't say if I suffer from gout but eating too much asparagus does cause gout like pain!

It appears that asparagus contains concentrated levels of purine (uric acid is formed from the breakdown of purines). Cauliflower, chicken, liver, kidney beans, lima beans, mushrooms, navy beans, oatmeal, peas salmon, spinach, and tuna are also purine-rich foods.

As such, any one with gout arthritis needs to watch the amount of purine-rich foods.

On the plus side, where asparagus is concerned, there is scientific evidence that the consumption of asparagus can increase urine production. It is also a good source of dietary fiber, folic acid, vitamin C, vitamin E, vitamin B6, and several minerals.

In my case, continue to eat asparagus but watch the amount!

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of SleepJoy. All opinions are 100% mine.

This past weekend, my family and I slept in rather comfortable beds at a fine hotel. It reminded me of what I was missing.

A soft, comfortable mattress.

Last year, I had some serious lower back and hip pain. A latex mattress did not help and neither did any of the cheap air mattresses. They only helped initially but the lower back and hip pain came back soon after.

While at an old car show that year, I met a lady who had a salon in town. At the show she offered a 12 minute back massages on a special massage chair. I told her about my lower back problem, the tense shoulders, which she could feel as she massaged me, and how I was on a quest for the perfect bed! She recommended that I put a memory foam mattress topper on my bed.

She told me to just get rid of the mattress, and just place the memory foam mattress topper on the hard bed. That was exactly what she was doing to ease her back pain. Getting a memory foam topper had not even crossed my mind. I was trying to avoid anything soft because I thought the soft mattress was the cause of all my lower back pain!

I ended up buying a rather hard mattress which worked really well with the lower back pain, but boy did I miss a soft and comfortable mattress as I was reminded from the weekend's stay at the fine hotel!

A hard mattress is not that bad if you are lying flat on your back, but when you want to lie on your side, a softer mattress is what you need! The 3” VitaTop layer of ViscoFresh enhanced memory foam from SleepJoy might work for me. It has medium firmness, and it is supposed to conform to my curve immediately. The fact that this particular topper is more breathable than an ordinary foam topper is an added plus!

I will have to give the memory foam mattress topper another look! I can still keep my hard mattress, and the topper can provide the softness I am missing!

Have you heard of any new cases of the H1N1?

I have not heard of any new cases in the county that I am living in but I did hear that there were a few cases of the H1N1 in Malaysia recently. Involving deaths even.

Last year, at the height of the H1N1 disease, I was quite ambivalent about the dangers of the disease. I chose not to take the vaccination for myself and decided against vaccinating my children from the disease as well. There was too much unknown about the vaccine, and the manufacture of the vaccine seemed rushed, because of the fears of a pandemic.

We will be traveling to Malaysia in the summer, and I have always been the kind of person who imagines the worse when there doesn't seem to be any danger. You know the kind of person who thinks there's always some evil creature lurking under the still waters? Known dangers don't worry me, because they are known!

That's how I feel about the seemingly quiet H1N1 activity. It seems to me that, when you least expect it, it strikes!

That is why during the school spring break, the kids and I took our H1N1 shots. We were lucky the last time, but maybe not this time. Better to be protected than sorry, eh!

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Trivita. All opinions are 100% mine.

For the last several months, I noticed that I had difficulty remembering things. I would forget the names of people, the names of things, and I struggled to complete my sentences because I could not remember the name of the person, or the thing I was trying to refer to while I was talking to my husband. I ended saying, "that thing", and of course my husband would ask, "what thing?"

I had no idea that what I was experiencing had to do with peri-menopause. It was while I was researching on the other peri-menopausal symptoms that I was experiencing that I came across information that forgetfulness was part and parcel of peri-menopause. Boy, was that a surprise!

Fortunately, there are vitamins and minerals that someone like me, who is going through peri-menopause, can take to help with the forgetfulness.

It is well-documented the positive effects of increasing vitamins B-12, B-6 and folic acid to one's diet. Positive effects like increased energy, improved memory, the lowering of the amino-acid homocysteine which has been linked to heart disease, and the relief from anemia.

I have started taking B-12 vitamin tablets but it does appear that the sublingual ones (dissolve under the tongue) are better absorbed into the bloodstream because they do not have to go through our digestive system!

Once I have used up the vitamin tablets I got, I will most definitely go for the sublingual B-12, B-6 & Folic Acid. No reason to not get the kind that goes to your blood stream directly and which works immediately! Get your box here.

I am so glad that the chills that I was experiencing are now gone. Probably the biggest factor is the warmer weather. Instead of chills I seem to be experiencing hot flashes more frequently during the night!

The only redeeming thing about the hot flashes thing is that it is quite short and even though I feel some sweat it is not really that bad. Let's say it is tolerable. I just sweep the covers aside and pull them back when I feel cool again.

I have started taking multi-vitamins especially the B12. The strange feeling I was experiencing in my legs or muscles seem to have improved since I started with the multi-vitamins.

I envy those who never experienced any of the symptoms before and after they reached menopause. On the other hand, I have read that there are others whose symptoms are lot worse than what I am going through. I should be thankful, at least for that!

Are chills one of the symptoms of perimenopause?

I had not considered that possibility till just now. I went online and did some googling and sure enough several women shared about experiencing chills during the tail end of their perimenopause.

The last several days, I had difficulty falling asleep because of chills. I had my electric blanket turned up, added an extra fleece blanket under the covers, and yet I could not feel warm. I was already wearing warm pajamas and socks to bed. Today, I removed the quilt top and replaced it with a comforter.

But the thing is, the last couple of hours before I get up in the morning, I start to feel too warm under the covers. That, however, is not new because the early morning hot flashes have been going on and off for the last four years.

I do not think adding the comforter to my bed covers is going to make a whole lot of difference. The chills do not have anything to do with the room being cold. It comes from within the body. It seems I will just have to put up with the chills till they pass during the night, or I get so tired that I fall asleep despite the chills.

Some of the perimenopausal symptoms that I am going through are not fun at all!