Never read soviet newspapers before dinner

This post was originally published on August 4th, 2012 on my personal blog.

From Mikhail Bulgakov’s wonderful novel Heart of a Dog:

—If you care about your digestion, my advice is — don’t talk about bolshevism or medicine at table. And, god forbid — never read soviet newspapers before dinner.

—Hmm… But there are no other newspapers.

—In that case don’t read any at all. Do you know I once made thirty tests in my clinic. And what do you think? The patients who never read newspapers felt excellent. Those whom I specially made read Pravda all lost weight. […] And not only did they lose weight. Their knee reflexes were retarded, they lost appetite and exhibited general depression.

Recently, whenever I find myself reading comments on Hacker News, speculations by tech pundits or another deep article from our creative, witty and intelligent bloggers I think of this quote. Then I replace bolshevism with semicolons, soviet newspapers with Svbtle blogs and Pravda with Hacker News. And then I close that tab and move on with my day.

My appetite has never been better.