Infinite Journeys

Why I believe Obama is on my side

2008-11-07T01:30:00.000-08:00

Here is a list of things he plans to do to help our country succeed and to better the lives of everyone in America, especially those with middle-incomes! Here are the ones that are most important to me:

Economy:

Enact a Windfall Profits Tax to Provide a $1,000 Emergency Energy Rebate to American Families:Barack Obama and Joe Biden will enact a windfall profits tax on excessive oil company profits to give American families an immediate $1,000 emergency energy rebate to help families pay rising bills. This relief would be a down payment on the Obama-Biden long-term plan to provide middle-class families with at least $1,000 per year in permanent tax relief.

Provide $50 billion to Jumpstart the Economy and Prevent 1 Million Americans from Losing Their Jobs: This relief would include a $25 billion State Growth Fund to prevent state and local cuts in health, education, housing, and heating assistance or counterproductive increases in property taxes, tolls or fees. The Obama-Biden relief plan will also include $25 billion in a Jobs and Growth Fund to prevent cutbacks in road and bridge maintenance and fund school repair - all to save more than 1 million jobs in danger of being cut.

Simplify Tax Filings for Middle Class Americans: Obama and Biden will dramatically simplify tax filings so that millions of Americans will be able to do their taxes in less than five minutes. Obama and Biden will ensure that the IRS uses the information it already gets from banks and employers to give taxpayers the option of pre-filled tax forms to verify, sign and return. Experts estimate that the Obama-Biden proposal will save Americans up to 200 million total hours of work and aggravation and up to $2 billion in tax preparer fees.

Fight for Fair Trade: Obama and Biden will fight for a trade policy that opens up foreign markets to support good American jobs. They will use trade agreements to spread good labor and environmental standards around the world and stand firm against agreements like the Central American Free Trade Agreement that fail to live up to those important benchmarks. Obama and Biden will also pressure the World Trade Organization to enforce trade agreements and stop countries from continuing unfair government subsidies to foreign exporters and nontariff barriers on U.S. exports.

Reward Companies that Support American Workers: Barack Obama introduced the Patriot Employer Act of 2007 with Senators Richard Durbin (D-IL) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH) to reward companies that create good jobs with good benefits for American workers. The legislation would provide a tax credit to companies that maintain or increase the number of full-time workers in America relative to those outside the US; maintain their corporate headquarters in America if it has ever been in America; pay decent wages; prepare workers for retirement; provide health insurance; and support employees who serve in the military.

Invest In A Clean Energy Economy And Create 5 Million New Green Jobs: Obama and Biden will invest $150 billion over 10 years to advance the next generation of biofuels and fuel infrastructure, accelerate the commercialization of plug-in hybrids, promote development of commercial scale renewable energy, invest in low emissions coal plants, and begin transition to a new digital electricity grid. The plan will also invest in America's highly-skilled manufacturing workforce and manufacturing centers to ensure that American workers have the skills and tools they need to pioneer the first wave of green technologies that will be in high demand throughout the world.

Invest in the Sciences: Barack Obama and Joe Biden support doubling federal funding for basic research and changing the posture of our federal government from being one of the most anti-science administrations in American history to one that embraces science and technology. This will foster home-grown innovation, help ensure the competitiveness of US technology-based businesses, and ensure that 21st century jobs can and will grow in America.

Deploy Next-Generation Broadband: Barack Obama and Joe Biden believe we can get broadband to every community in America through a combination of reform of the Universal Service Fund, better use of the nation's wireless spectrum, promotion of next-generation facilities, technologies and applications, and new tax and loan incentives.

Provide Tax Relief for Small Businesses and Start Up Companies: Barack Obama and Joe Biden will eliminate all capital gains taxes on start-up and small businesses to encourage innovation and job creation. Obama and Biden will also support small business owners by providing a $500 “Making Work Pay” tax credit to almost every worker in America. Self-employed small business owners pay both the employee and the employer side of the payroll tax, and this measure will reduce the burdens of this double taxation.

Raise the Minimum Wage: Barack Obama and Joe Biden will raise the minimum wage, index it to inflation and increase the Earned Income Tax Credit to make sure that full-time workers earn a living wage that allows them to raise their families and pay for basic needs.

Create a Credit Card Rating System to Improve Disclosure: Obama and Biden will create a credit card rating system, modeled on five-star systems used for other consumer products, to provide consumers an easily identifiable ranking of credit cards, based on the card's features. Credit card companies will be required to display the rating on all application and contract materials, enabling consumers to quickly understand all of the major provisions of a credit card without having to rely exclusively on fine print in lengthy documents.

Expand the Family and Medical Leave Act: The FMLA covers only certain employees of employers with 50 or more employees. Obama and Biden will expand it to cover businesses with 25 or more employees. They will expand the FMLA to cover more purposes as well, including allowing workers to take leave for elder care needs; allowing parents up to 24 hours of leave each year to participate in their children's academic activities; and expanding FMLA to cover leave for employees to address domestic violence.

Expand High-Quality Afterschool Opportunities: Obama and Biden will double funding for the main federal support for afterschool programs, the 21st Century Learning Centers program, to serve a million more children. Obama and Biden will include measures to maximize performance and effectiveness across grantees nationwide.

Protect Against Caregiver Discrimination: Workers with family obligations often are discriminated against in the workplace. Obama and Biden will enforce the recently-enacted Equal Employment Opportunity Commission guidelines on caregiver discrimination.

Expand Flexible Work Arrangements: Obama and Biden will create a program to inform businesses about the benefits of flexible work schedules; help businesses create flexible work opportunities; and increase federal incentives for telecommuting. Obama and Biden will also make the federal government a model employer in terms of adopting flexible work schedules and permitting employees to request flexible arrangements.

Ending the Iraq War:

Barack Obama and Joe Biden believe we must be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were careless getting in. Immediately upon taking office, Obama will give his Secretary of Defense and military commanders a new mission in Iraq: ending the war. The removal of our troops will be responsible and phased, directed by military commanders on the ground and done in consultation with the Iraqi government. Military experts believe we can safely redeploy combat brigades from Iraq at a pace of 1 to 2 brigades a month that would remove them in 16 months. That would be the summer of 2010 – more than 7 years after the war began.

Under the Obama-Biden plan, a residual force will remain in Iraq and in the region to conduct targeted counter-terrorism missions against al Qaeda in Iraq and to protect American diplomatic and civilian personnel. They will not build permanent bases in Iraq, but will continue efforts to train and support the Iraqi security forces as long as Iraqi leaders move toward political reconciliation and away from sectarianism.

Barack Obama and Joe Biden believe that America has both a moral obligation and a responsibility for security that demands we confront Iraq’s humanitarian crisis—more than five million Iraqis are refugees or are displaced inside their own country. Obama and Biden will form an international working group to address this crisis. They will provide at least $2 billion to expand services to Iraqi refugees in neighboring countries, and ensure that Iraqis inside their own country can find sanctuary. Obama and Biden will also work with Iraqi authorities and the international community to hold the perpetrators of potential war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide accountable. They will reserve the right to intervene militarily, with our international partners, to suppress potential genocidal violence within Iraq.

Providing Health Care For All:

On health care reform, the American people are too often offered two extremes - government-run health care with higher taxes or letting the insurance companies operate without rules. Barack Obama and Joe Biden believe both of these extremes are wrong, and that’s why they’ve proposed a plan that strengthens employer coverage, makes insurance companies accountable and ensures patient choice of doctor and care without government interference.

The Obama-Biden plan provides affordable, accessible health care for all Americans, builds on the existing health care system, and uses existing providers, doctors and plans to implement the plan. Under the Obama-Biden plan, patients will be able to make health care decisions with their doctors, instead of being blocked by insurance company bureaucrats.

Under the plan, if you like your current health insurance, nothing changes, except your costs will go down by as much as $2,500 per year.

If you don’t have health insurance, you will have a choice of new, affordable health insurance options.

# Require insurance companies to cover pre-existing conditions so all Americans regardless of their health status or history can get comprehensive benefits at fair and stable premiums.
# Create a new Small Business Health Tax Credit to help small businesses provide affordable health insurance to their employees.
# Lower costs for businesses by covering a portion of the catastrophic health costs they pay in return for lower premiums for employees.
# Prevent insurers from overcharging doctors for their malpractice insurance and invest in proven strategies to reduce preventable medical errors.
# Establish a National Health Insurance Exchange with a range of private insurance options as well as a new public plan based on benefits available to members of Congress that will allow individuals and small businesses to buy affordable health coverage.
# Ensure everyone who needs it will receive a tax credit for their premiums.
* Lower drug costs by allowing the importation of safe medicines from other developed countries, increasing the use of generic drugs in public programs and taking on drug companies that block cheaper generic medicines from the market
* Require hospitals to collect and report health care cost and quality data
* Reduce the costs of catastrophic illnesses for employers and their employees.
* Reform the insurance market to increase competition by taking on anticompetitive activity that drives up prices without improving quality of care.

The Obama-Biden plan will promote public health. It will require coverage of preventive services, including cancer screenings, and increase state and local preparedness for terrorist attacks and natural disasters.

A Commitment to Fiscal Responsibility: Barack Obama will pay for his $50 - $65 billion health care reform effort by rolling back the Bush tax cuts for Americans earning more than $250,000 per year and retaining the estate tax at its 2009 level.

Protecting America:

Find, Disrupt, and Destroy Al Qaeda: Obama will responsibly end the war in Iraq and focus on the right battlefield in Afghanistan. An Obama Administration will work with other nations to strengthen their capacity to eliminate shared enemies.

New Capabilities to Aggressively Defeat Terrorists: Barack Obama and Joe Biden will improve the American intelligence apparatus by investing in its capacity to collect and analyze information, share information with other agencies and carry out operations to disrupt terrorist operations and networks.

Prepare the Military to Meet 21st Century Threats: Barack Obama will not hesitate to use military force to take out terrorists who pose a threat to America. Obama will ensure that our military becomes more stealthy, agile, and lethal in its ability to capture or kill terrorists. He will bolster our military's ability to speak different languages, navigate different cultures, and coordinate complex missions with our civilian agencies.

Win the Battle of Ideas: An Obama Administration will defeat al Qaeda in what the 9-11 Commission called "the Battle of Ideas" by returning to an American foreign policy consistent with America's traditional values and by working with moderates within the Islamic world to counter al Qaeda propaganda. Barack Obama will establish a $2 billion Global Education Fund to work to eliminate the global education deficit and offer an alternative to extremist schools.

Restore American Influence and Restore Our Values: Thwarting terrorist networks requires international partnerships in military, intelligence, law enforcement, financial transactions, border controls, and transportation security. To make diplomacy more effective, Obama will stop shuttering consulates and start opening them in the tough and hopeless corners of the world. He will expand our foreign service, and develop the capacity of our civilian aid workers to work alongside the military.

Secure Nuclear Weapons Materials in Four Years and End Nuclear Smuggling: Barack Obama will lead a global effort to secure all nuclear weapons materials at vulnerable sites within four years - the most effective way to prevent terrorists from acquiring a nuclear bomb. Barack Obama will fully implement the Lugar-Obama legislation to help our allies detect and stop the smuggling of weapons of mass destruction.

Convene a Summit on Preventing Nuclear Terrorism: Barack Obama will convene a summit in 2009 (and regularly thereafter) of leaders of Permanent Members of the UN Security Council and other key countries to agree on implementing many of these measures on a global basis.

Eliminate Iran's and North Korea's Nuclear Weapons Programs Through Tough, Direct Diplomacy: Barack Obama will use tough diplomacy - backed by real incentives and real pressures - to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and to eliminate fully and verifiably North Korea's nuclear weapons program.

Prevent Nuclear Fuel from Becoming Nuclear Bombs: Barack Obama will work with other interested governments to establish a new international nuclear energy architecture - including an international nuclear fuel bank, international nuclear fuel cycle centers, and reliable fuel supply assurances - to meet growing demands for nuclear power without contributing to the proliferation of nuclear materials and fuel production facilities.

Set the Goal of a Nuclear-Free World: Barack Obama will show the world that America believes in its existing commitment under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty to work to ultimately eliminate all nuclear weapons. Barack Obama fully supports reaffirming this goal, as called for by George Shultz, Henry Kissinger, William Perry, and Sam Nunn, and the specific steps they propose to move us in that direction. He has made clear that America will not disarm unilaterally.

Work with Russia to Increase Warning and Decision Time: Keeping nuclear weapons ready to launch on a moment's notice is a dangerous relic of the Cold War. Barack Obama believes that we must address this dangerous situation. As president, Barack Obama will aim to work with Russia to end such Cold War policies in a mutual and verifiable manner.
Strengthen Nuclear Risk Reduction Work at Defense, State, and Energy Departments: Thwarting terrorist networks requires international partnerships in military, intelligence, law enforcement, financial transactions, border controls, and transportation security. To make diplomacy more effective, Obama will stop shuttering consulates and start opening them in the tough and hopeless corners of the world. He will expand our foreign service, and develop the capacity of our civilian aid workers to work alongside the military.

Accelerate the Development of New Medicines, Vaccines, and Production Capabilities: Barack Obama will build on America's unparalleled talent to create new drugs, vaccines, and diagnostic tests and to manufacture these vital products much more quickly and efficiently than is now possible.

Lead an International Effort to Diminish Impact of Major Infectious Disease Epidemics: Senator Obama was one of the first legislators to recognize the dangers of a potential avian influenza pandemic and was successful in securing $25 million for U.S. agencies to combat and contain widespread outbreaks of avian flu and worked to provide $4 billion in funding to the Centers for Disease Control to combat avian flu. Barack Obama will continue to promote international efforts to develop new diagnostics, vaccines, and medicines that will be available and affordable in all parts of the world.

Initiate a Safe Computing R&D Effort and Harden our Nation's Cyber Infrastructure: Barack Obama will support an initiative to develop next-generation secure computers and networking for national security applications. He will work with industry and academia to develop and deploy a new generation of secure hardware and software for our nation's critical cyber infrastructure.

Protect the IT Infrastructure That Keeps America's Economy Safe: The public and private infrastructure that keeps America running is increasingly brought online to improve efficiency and reduce costs. Barack Obama will work with the private sector to establish tough new standards for cyber security and physical resilience for critical infrastructure.

Mandate Standards for Securing Personal Data and Require Companies to Disclose Personal Information Data Breaches: Nearly 10 million Americans are victims of identity theft each year, costing more than $55 billion. We must ensure that the privacy of personnel data in computer systems is better protected. The federal government must partner with industry and our citizens to secure personal data stored on government and private systems. An Obama administration will institute a common standard for securing such data across industries and will back strong legislation to protect the rights of individuals in the information age.

Prepare Effective Emergency Response Plans: Obama passed legislation to provide funding for planning for evacuating individuals with special needs from emergency zones and to create a National Family Locator System to help families locate loved ones after a disaster. As president, Obama will further improve coordination between all levels of government, create better evacuation plan guidelines, ensure prompt federal assistance to emergency zones, and increase medical surge capacity.

Support First Responders: Barack Obama is committed not only to rolling back the Bush-McCain funding cuts that have affected our first responders - police, firefighters, and emergency medical professionals - but also to increasing federal resources and logistic support to local emergency planning efforts.

Improve Interoperable Communications Systems: Barack Obama supports efforts to provide greater technical assistance to local and state first responders and dramatically increase funding for reliable, interoperable communications systems. He will appoint a National Chief Technology Officer who will have the responsibility to ensure that the current non-interoperable plans at the federal, state, and local levels are combined, funded, implemented and effective.

Secure our Chemical Plants: Chemical plants are potential terrorist targets because they are often located near cities, are relatively easy to attack, and contain multi-ton quantities of hazardous chemicals. As president, Barack Obama will work with all stakeholders to enact permanent federal chemical security regulations.

Improve Airline Security: Barack Obama believes we must redouble our efforts to determine if the measures implemented since 9/11 are adequately addressing the threats our nation continues to face from airplane-based terrorism. Airline passengers are still not screened against a comprehensive terrorist watch list. Such a list must be developed and used in a way that safeguards passengers' privacy while ensuring the safety of air travel.

Monitor our Ports: Barack Obama has been a consistent supporter of strengthening our port security, will redouble our efforts to develop technology that can detect radiation and determine the danger it poses, and he will work with the maritime transportation industry to integrate this technology into their operations so as to maximize security without causing economic disruption.

Safeguard Public Transportation: Every weekday, Americans take 34 million trips on public transportation systems to get to work, school and beyond. Despite recent international attacks on mass transit systems, the Bush administration has invested only a small fraction of the $6 billion that transportation officials have said is necessary to implement needed security improvements. Barack Obama will fill this critical hole in our homeland security network.

Improve Border Security: Americans know that our national border security system is broken, leaving our country vulnerable. Barack Obama will support the virtual and physical infrastructure and manpower necessary to secure our borders and keep our nation safe.

Foreign Policy:

Obama supports tough, direct presidential diplomacy with Iran without preconditions. Now is the time to pressure Iran directly to change their troubling behavior. Obama and Biden will offer the Iranian regime a choice. If Iran abandons its nuclear program and support for terrorism, we will offer incentives like membership in the World Trade Organization, economic investments, and a move toward normal diplomatic relations. If Iran continues its troubling behavior, we will step up our economic pressure and political isolation. Seeking this kind of comprehensive settlement with Iran is our best way to make progress.

Obama and Biden are willing to meet with the leaders of all nations, friend and foe. They will do the careful preparation necessary, but will signal that America is ready to come to the table, and that he is willing to lead. And if America is willing to come to the table, the world will be more willing to rally behind American leadership to deal with challenges like terrorism, and Iran and North Korea's nuclear programs.

Obama and Biden will embrace the Millennium Development Goal of cutting extreme poverty around the world in half by 2015, and they will double our foreign assistance to $50 billion to achieve that goal. They will help the world's weakest states to build healthy and educated communities, reduce poverty, develop markets, and generate wealth.

# Secure Loose Nuclear Materials from Terrorists: Obama and Biden will secure all loose nuclear materials in the world within four years. While we work to secure existing stockpiles of nuclear material, Obama and Biden will negotiate a verifiable global ban on the production of new nuclear weapons material. This will deny terrorists the ability to steal or buy loose nuclear materials.
# Strengthen the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty: Obama and Biden will crack down on nuclear proliferation by strengthening the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty so that countries like North Korea and Iran that break the rules will automatically face strong international sanctions.

Change the Culture of Secrecy: Obama will reverse President Bush's policy of secrecy. He will institute a National Declassification Center to make declassification secure but routine, efficient, and cost-effective.

Engaging the American People on Foreign Policy: Obama and Biden will bring foreign policy decisions directly to the people by requiring his national security officials to have periodic national broadband town hall meetings to discuss foreign policy. They will personally deliver occasional fireside chats via webcast.

To view the full list of information and visit Obama/Biden's new site, go to: http://www.change.gov/. You can also submit your own view and stories of things you want changed or added and why! Very cool!

Notice to your pets - very cute!

2008-10-09T23:04:00.001-07:00

To be posted VERY LOW on the refrigerator door - pet nose height.

Dear Dogs and/or Cats:

The dishes with the paw prints are yours and contain your food. The other

dishes are mine and contain my food. Please note, placing a paw print in

the middle of my plate and food does not stake a claim for it becoming

your food and dish. I do not find it aesthetically pleasing in the slightest.

The stairway was not designed by NASCAR and is not a racetrack. Beating

me to the bottom is not the object. Tripping me doesn't help because I fall faster than you can run.

I cannot buy anything bigger than a king sized bed. I am very sorry about

this. Do not think I will continue sleeping on the couch to ensure your

comfort. Dogs & cats can actually curl up in a ball when they sleep. It is

not necessary to sleep perpendicular to each other stretched out to the

fullest extent possible. I also know that sticking tails straight out &

having tongues hanging out the other end to maximize space is nothing

but sarcasm.
For the last time, there is no secret exit from the bathroom. If by some

miracle I beat you there & manage to get the door shut, it isnʼt necessary

to claw & whine, try to turn the knob or get your paw under the edge & try

to pull the door open. I must exit through the same door that I entered.

I have been using the bathroom for years --canine or feline attendance is

not required.

The proper order is kiss me, then go smell the other dog or cat's butt. I cannot stress this enough!

To pacify you, my dear pets, I will post the following message:

To All Non-Pet Owners Who Visit & Like to Complain About Our Pets:

1. They live here- You don't.

2. If you don't want their hair on your clothes, stay off the furniture. That's why they call it 'fur'niture.

3. I like my pets a lot better than I like most people.

4. To you, they are an animal. To me, they are an adopted child who is short, hairy, walks on all fours and doesn't speak clearly..

Remember: Dogs and cats are better than kids because they:

1. Eat less

2. Don't ask for money all the time

3 Are easier to train

4. Normally come when called

5. Never ask to drive the car

6. Don't hang out with drug-using friends

7. Don't smoke or drink

8. Don't have to buy the latest fashions

9. Don't want to wear your clothes

10. Don't need a gazillion dollars for college, and...

11. If they get pregnant, you can sell their children

Pics below of my kitty plus all of my favorite animals, including the ones I take care of :)

He's very very photogenic and will start posing when I get the camera out. It's really amusing.

Various but not all of, the animal friends that I have had in the past and currently. :)

On a more positive note, circus elephants may soon be treated humanely!

2008-09-28T02:22:00.000-07:00

I have been anti-circuses since I was very little. I think my grandparents took me to the circus when I was a little girl and I remember feeling very traumatized, as if I was experiencing how each animal felt at that moment in time. I was very sad and felt very sick inside. Since then I have signed petitions and have been to a few rallies to try to ban circuses in the United States or at least one state at a time. Finally, I have just discovered some news that makes me very happy:

Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus Will Stand Trial

Born Free USA united with Animal Protection Institute (Born Free USA), along with three other animal protection organizations and a former Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus (Ringling) employee, is suing Ringling for violating the Endangered Species Act by cruelly mistreating Asian elephants. The trial is set to commence on October 20, 2008.

The Asian elephant is currently listed as an endangered species under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), meaning that any acts that would �harm, wound, injure, harass, or kill� an Asian elephant in the wild or in captivity are prohibited. The lawsuit alleges that a number of routine practices by Ringling are in violation of the Endangered Species Act, including the forceful use of a bullhook and the chaining of elephants for most of the day and night. We have amassed a wealth of evidence to support these claims.
Bullhook Use

Bradley Stookey

A bullhook, or ankus, is made of wood, metal, or other substantial material. It is approximately 2 to 3 feet long, and at one end is a sharp steel hook and poker. It is used to poke, prod, strike, and hit animals to �train� them � all for a few moments of human amusement.

We have video footage of Ringling employees repeatedly hitting elephants with bullhooks, as well as video footage of the daily hitting and �hooking� of the elephants to make them stay in line, move in a particular direction, or perform on cue.

In addition, we have Ringling�s own internal written documents that discuss the mistreatment of the elephants. For example, Ringling�s animal behaviorist reported �an elephant dripping blood all over the arena floor during the show from being hooked.� In an internal email, a Ringling veterinary assistant reported that �[a]fter this morning�s baths, at least 4 of the elephants came in with multiple abrasions and lacerations from the hooks.� After the release of this information to the public, Ringling moved to prohibit the release of any additional information to the public provided via discovery.
Chaining

Bradley Stookey

Chaining is one of the most common methods used to confine elephants in captivity. It severely restricts an elephant�s movements, eliminating its ability to lie down, walk, or socialize with other elephants. The severity of these restrictions can result in neurotic psychological behavior, physical injury, and even the death of captive elephants.

Newly obtained evidence based on the circus�s own documents reveals that Ringling keeps elephants virtually immobilized in chains for the majority of their lives. Internal records show that the elephants are chained while confined in boxcars for an average of more than 26 hours at a time, and sometimes for as much as 60�100 hours, as the circus moves across the country.

In addition, former Ringling employees will be testifying about the mistreatment they witnessed while working for the circus, all of which corroborates the claims alleged in this case.

* The lawsuit is before the Honorable Emmet J. Sullivan in federal district court in the District of Columbia and is being handled by Meyer Glitzenstein & Crystal, one of the country�s preeminent environmental law firms.
You Can Help

Please donate to the Elephant Defense Fund and help ensure that we win our lawsuit. With your support, we will do everything we can to end the mistreatment of elephants in circuses and traveling shows. We must not fail.

More tributes to Paul Newman, from the car racing community

2008-09-28T02:14:00.000-07:00

Racing community saddened by death of Paul Newman
By MARK VAUGHN
Paul Newman, Christian Fittipaldi and Carl Hass sport lucky cigars after Fittipaldi won the CART race at Road America in 1999
LAT PHOTOGRAPHIC
Paul Newman: A racer remembered

PHOTO GALLERY
Paul Leonard Newman was a racer who supported his habit by acting. That’s how he would have wanted to be remembered--and was, in an outpouring of condolences from the racing community.

Racer/actor/philanthropist Newman, who managed to succeed in all three fields, died Friday after a long battle with cancer. He was 83.

He came to racing late in life, driving his first race car in his forties. Bob Bondurant trained him to drive for the 1969 movie Winning at the then-brand-new Bondurant School, which at the time was using Datsun 510s, Datsun roadsters and a single Formula Vee at Orange County International Raceway in California.

Newman was the fourth student at the new school. Co-star Robert Wagner was the fifth.

“I asked him why he wanted to go to my school and he said, ‘I had two other movies I could make quite a bit of money in, but I wanted to see if I could drive a race car.’ ”

Turns out he could, and Newman fell in love with racing from the start.

"The first thing that I ever found I had any grace in", Newman once said.

He would race for the rest of his life. Many of his first rides were in Datsuns prepared by Bob Sharp, who was an accomplished racer himself and became a Datsun dealer in 1969. One of Newman’s earliest rides was a Bob Sharp Datsun 510 in SCCA B Production. He piloted BSR Zs, too.

“We spent a lot of Tuesdays up at Lime Rock with him following my line and me following him,” recalled Sharp. “He wanted a Z car but I put him in a 510 sedan instead. I thought he’d learn more in a less powerful car.”

Newman’s first race win was probably in one of those Bob Sharp 510s, though an early win is listed in a Lotus Elan in Thompson, Conn., in 1972. Whichever was first, there were many more to come in one of the longest racing careers on record.

Newman co-drove a Porsche 935 at LeMans in 1979 with Dick Barbour and Rolf Stommelen to first place in the IMSA class and second overall.

Among drivers who piloted his race cars was Elliott Forbes-Robinson, who raced for Newman in Can Am and became a friend. Robinson was impressed with Newman’s acumen behind the wheel.

“He was an excellent driver the whole time,” Forbes-Robinson recalled. “It was an absolute pleasure to work with him--if you showed him something, he wouldn’t come into the pits and say he couldn’t do it or complain about something, he’d go out and do it. He was great.”

Newman raced sports cars in endurance events, which meant he had a lot of co-drivers over the years. Among them was Sam Posey.

“Paul was guided in much of what he did by the attitude, ‘Why not?’ ” recalled Posey, who remained a friend throughout life. “He embraced projects that called for a leap of faith. Become a racing driver, starting in your mid 40s and putting your acting career at risk? Why not? Turn a few cases of salad dressing made in your basement into a commercial food empire--and then use the profits to create camps for sick children? Why not? If this sounds naive, it wasn’t. He calculated the odds. In real life, he never asked, ‘Who are those guys?’ He knew.”

From the mid ‘70s to the early ‘90s, Newman drove for the Bob Sharp Racing team, mainly in Datsuns and Nissans. He won four SCCA national titles: D-production in 1976, C-production in ’79 and GT-1 in 1985-86. He raced in Trans-Am and even in the Baja 1000.

As a team owner he joined Carl Haas in 1983 to form Newman-Haas racing, which went on to win 97 races and seven championships.

He never seemed to tire of the other side of the sport, though, staying behind the wheel long after most reasonable men had given up even playing golf. At 70 he co-drove a Mustang to victory in the GTS class of the 24 Hours of Daytona, the oldest driver to win a major sanctioned race. A decade later he was still at it.

“My last recollection of him was a few years back when Panoz was just finishing the front-engined LMP racer,” said designer Peter Brock. “The Panoz crew had the new car out at Road Atlanta for a test with a couple of notable shoes who were looking for the ride. Since P.L. was there he was offered the chance to test the car. He hadn't been in a race car for over a year and in truth looked pretty frail. The shoes had just put up some pretty impressive times so the bar was set. P.L. got in and within five or six laps had matched 'em! He got out and quietly thanked the crew for the opportunity and left. Just amazing.”

“He drove less frequently in the last few years,” recalled Posey. “But his car was a brutish Corvette which had his age as its number. I remember when it was No. 81 and he was racing at Lime Rock. It was raining, and the track had standing water at several places. Any sensible 81-year-old would have put the thing on the trailer, but Paul got out there, out braked the field into Turn One, got into a slide at about 120 mph, corrected deftly, and shot through into the lead, which he never lost.”

The Newman’s Own Foundation, which has directed over $250 million to charity over the years, gave perhaps the best summation of his life:

“Paul Newman's craft was acting. His passion was racing. His love was his family and friends. And his heart and soul were dedicated to helping make the world a better place for all.”

On Saturday, Indianapolis Motor Speedway CEO and Indy Racing League founder Tony George said: "On behalf of my mother Mari Human George and the entire Hulman-George family at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and IndyCar Series, our thoughts and prayers are with the family, friends and loved ones of Paul Newman. To all his fans world-wide and those close to him in our racing community, we share a deep sense of loss, but cherish the many fond memories we will forever carry with us."

More Reaction:

“On behalf of Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing, my wife Bernadette and myself, I want to express our most sincere condolences to Joanne and the entire Newman family on the loss of a great human being. Paul and I have been partners for 26 years and I have come to know his passion, humor and above all, his generosity. Not just economic generosity, but generosity of spirit. His support of the team’s drivers, crew and the racing industry is legendary. His pure joy at winning a pole position or winning a race exemplified the spirit he brought to his life and to all those that knew him. We will truly miss him.”

-- Carl A. Haas, co-owner of Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing

"We truly lost a great man. Most of us knew him as Butch or Fast Eddie from the theater or from our living rooms at home. He was much more than a great actor. His legacy will be his five children, his wife, Joanne, and all the sick children around the world who desperately needed his help. Paul was a man of character who cared about the world and the people who lived in it. Putting a smile on a young person’s face and helping people in need was a virtue he excelled at. Little did anyone realize a child born of such humble beginnings could affect our lives in so many positive ways. We should all learn to live by his example. We will miss him dearly but will never forget him."

-- Michael Lanigan, co-owner of Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing

“We are deeply saddened by the passing of Mr. Newman. He was a man of great courage, determination and integrity and gave a lot not only to the world of auto racing, but to the world around us. His generosity knew no bounds and his work with helping children as well as what he achieved with aiding the environment will prove to help people for many years to come.”

“I had the pleasure of driving for Mr. Newman in 1981 and I was richer for the experience. He was a man of class and he was also deservedly very highly regarded for his driving skills. The world is a poorer place today for his passing.”

-- Bobby Rahal, Rahal Letterman Racing

"Paul Newman--a real American hero, an inspiration to me in much that I have attempted in my adult life. Not so much for the parts he played, but for the man that he was. He was one of Hollywood's greatest. He could not only talk the talk on film, but more importantly could walk the walk as a private citizen. As a young man he was an American hero who served his country in one of the U.S. Army Air Corps' most dangerous assignments in Western Europe. Additionally, his charitable enterprises have generated tens of millions for the benefit of hundreds of thousands of underprivileged Americans. He will be never forgotten. May he rest in peace."

-- Jack Roush, owner, Roush Fenway Racing

"It’s truly a sad day. Paul was one of the most iconic figures not just in motorsports, but through his life in general. He was so much more a contributor to the world than a taker. He was a dear friend and will be missed.”

-- Don Panoz, founder of the American Le Mans Series and a close friend of Newman

“I probably wouldn’t be racing today if it wasn’t for Paul Newman. The first time I got in the car that year, he was faster than I was. Even recently, he was still incredibly quick and could get around Lime Rock (his home track) better than anyone. He has been such a huge influence on my career and has been a close friend of our family for a long time.”

-- Gunnar Jeannette, driver who first raced with Newman in 2000

“We were introduced driving Ferraris in 1977 at Daytona, and we developed a mutual friendship. Paul was so passionate about driving. He told me a few times that he didn’t really care for Hollywood, and that it was just a business. He really wished he had started driving earlier and made that his career. He was very consistent, never put a wheel off and was easy on the equipment.”

-- Dick Barbour, Robertson Racing

“There was a legend quality to Paul Newman not unlike Mario (Andretti). He was a guy who you’d see and be around and just realize how much love and passion he had for racing. I always admired, as did others in the paddock, how he would often put racing before his movie career. I remember a time when he missed an important movie awards show in order to be at one of our events. He was a very sweet person to talk to about everything, not just racing. He will be sadly missed.”

-- Adrian Fernandez, Lowe’s Fernandez Racing driver and owner

“Most of the world knew Paul as in incredible person and one of the best actors we were ever able to witness as well as a great philanthropist. But those of us in racing were very blessed to witness his passion for this sport, which was very apparent. He was one of the few high-profile owners to attend tests and this made all of us see him as one of us. This is very sad news indeed and we will miss him tremendously.”

-- Gil de Ferran, a two-time CART champion and former Indianapolis 500 winner

“Everyone treated him as a fellow competitor, not as a celebrity. He came here as a racer, was serious about his racing and…he was good. It was amazing that he was as good as he was at his age. And, he liked going fast. Back in the day when Bob Sharp was building the incredibly fast Nissans/Datsons, Newman was racing at Long Beach with Sharp along with the Indy Cars. Newman was the fastest guy down the straight--faster then the Indy Cars. And when I say fast, I don’t mean lap time…I mean speed. He always enjoyed having a car with a big motor. He was a huge supporter of the track. Everyone (the staff, friends and myself) at Lime Rock Park will miss him.”

-- Skip Barber, president, Lime Rock Park

"Paul Newman's craft was acting. His passion was racing. His love was his family and friends. And his heart and soul were dedicated to helping make the world a better place for all. Paul had an abiding belief in the role that luck plays in one's life, and its randomness. He was quick to acknowledge the good fortune he had in his own life, beginning with being born in America, and was acutely aware of how unlucky so many others were. True to his character, he quietly devoted himself to helping offset this imbalance. An exceptional example is the legacy of Newman's Own. What started as something of a joke in the basement of his home, turned into a highly-respected, multi-million-dollar-a-year food company. And true to form, he shared this good fortune by donating all the profits and royalties he earned to thousands of charities around the world, a total which now exceeds $250 million."

-- Robert Forrester, vice chairman, Newman's Own Foundation

“I am extremely saddened to hear about Paul’s passing. He was a great guy to be with around the track. He was one of a kind. Obviously I am just thinking of his family and wishing them well while they are trying to deal with this. It can’t be easy. He’s going to be missed, not just in the motor racing world but in every area that he participated in, in his life. He affected so many people in a positive way. I’m going to miss him and am fortunate to have known him.”

-- Justin Wilson, driver of the No. 02 McDonald’s race car for Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing

“It has been a very upsetting 24 hours for the team and my family. Paul has been a huge part of both my success as well as my father’s. and he will be greatly missed. He was a tremendous man, one that everyone should model their lives after. My sincere condolences go out to the Newman family.”

-- Graham Rahal, driver of the No. 06 Hole in the Wall Camps race car for Newman/Haas/Lanigan Racing

R.I.P. Paul Newman

2008-09-28T02:11:00.000-07:00

This is so sad. My mom will be really sad. She was forever in love with Paul Newman. I didn't know his cancer was so advanced. Cancer is scary! Rest in peace Paul. Thank you for all that you gave and all that you inspired in our lives.

Paul Newman: Rebel, rogue, hero

By Neil Smith
Entertainment reporter, BBC News

Paul Newman
Newman was voted the greatest actor of all time by film experts in 2001

From Butch Cassidy and Cool Hand Luke to Fast Eddie Felson, Paul Newman brought an integrity, vigour and wry impertinence to his roles that clicked with the anti-authoritarian spirit of the '60s and '70s.

Initially hamstrung by those piercing blue eyes and matinee idol features, he deliberately sought out more challenging, anti-heroic parts that ensured his career outlasted many of his contemporaries.

His characters - convicts, outlaws, con men and hustlers - were far from admirable. His gift, however, was to invest them with a charm, humour and crumpled nobility that made them irresistible to men and women alike.

It was this that enabled him in later life to become a distinguished character actor capable of elevating films like Road to Perdition, Message in a Bottle and The Hudsucker Proxy by his sheer force of presence.

Screenwriter William Goldman, who worked with Newman on Harper and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, once described him as "the least star-like superstar" he'd ever met.

Limelight

"He's an educated man and a trained actor and he never wants more close-ups," he wrote in his 1984 memoir Adventures in the Screen Trade.

"What he wants is the best possible script he can have. And he loves to be surrounded by the finest actors available, because he believes the better they are, the better the picture's apt to be."

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Newman (right) was due to play Sundance until Redford joined the film
That was certainly true in Butch Cassidy, in which Newman forged one of cinema's most iconic screen partnerships with co-star Robert Redford.

When he wanted to, however, the Ohio-born actor was more than capable of stealing the limelight.

Take The Hustler, for example, in which, as brash and cocksure pool shark Eddie Felson, he effortlessly upstaged the likes of Jackie Gleason and George C Scott.

Reprising the role in 1986's The Color of Money opposite an up-and-coming Tom Cruise landed Newman his only competitive Oscar.

In truth, however, he'd done better work earlier that decade in 1981's Absence of Malice and The Verdict the following year.

In the former, directed by Sydney Pollack, Newman played a businessman whose familial ties to organised crime saw him persecuted both by the US judiciary and an irresponsible press.

In the latter, he played an alcoholic lawyer who tried to salvage his tarnished reputation by taking on a daunting medical malpractice case.

One man alone, fighting the impossible fight against the odds, was a role Newman would return to many times.

And even if that fight was ultimately unsuccessful, as in Cool Hand Luke, his refusal to back down ensured he'd always be a winner in the audience's eyes.

"What we've got here is a failure to communicate!" cries his non-conformist prisoner at the end of that 1967 classic.

That, of course, was something the actor himself could never be accused of. Whatever the role, whatever the film, his inherent decency always came over loud and clear.

The hugging lion Christian

2008-09-10T23:15:00.000-07:00

I'm not quite sure when this happened but I found this on one of the blogs in my Google reader tonight. This is the sweet story of Christian, the Hugging Lion, and his two owners and their story. This just shows more evidence that if you're in an animals age either from a young age, where you have raised them into an adult or if you spent several years getting to know and bonding with an animal, that he or she will always remember you!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pmV6tlvZHk&feature=related

Error below!

2008-09-10T22:18:00.000-07:00

Here are the pictures that are supposed to be below, under my story about Crash. I could not figure out how to erase the 2nd Tango set and put in new Crash photos but it kept coming out that way no matter what I did. ARGH....

Good days, bad days and everything in between...

2008-09-10T20:03:00.000-07:00

So quite a lot has happened over the past month or so. All good, bad and neutral. During the middle of July and some into August, I had the opportunity to take care of a client/friend's dog, named Tango. He was a med sized Corgi, much more red than ones I have seen previously but very handsome and with quite a character/personality. He was a great dog, you could tell that he really got a lot out of everyday life as a dog, really lived each day to its' fullest. And I could take him with me, the next best thing for me as a pet sitter - any dog/animal that I can take with me in the car and go on errands, hiking, camping, to events, etc. So where I went, he went. He just loved being center of my world, he always paid attention to me. We went into this coffee shop and instead of him paying attention to the pets he was getting, he only looked up at me with a big grin on his face. When we went to the Pescadero Beach and I brought Blue with us, he and blue chased each other all over the place, and there was Tango chasing Blue down, acting like he was twice his size. I had so much fun with him and he loved to spoon and cuddle in bed. It was amusing sleeping next to a slightly overweight Corgi, who was cuddled up right alongside of you and also snored! He was in my care for almost a month, as his owner took about an extra 4 days over to be away. When she got back, I learned that something was wrong with him all of a sudden, he could barely walk the next day after she got home. I felt bad, like maybe I had walked him too much or he just got sore from all of the running around he had done at the dog park. Unfortunately when he was taken to the vet a few days later, it came back that this lymph nodes under his elbows were super swollen and then the biopsy came back and said that he had very advanced Lymphosarchoma. When I got that email, I cried for hours and then off and on throughout the day. I started emailing people who had gotten to meet him over the previous weekend. He got to meet my Gramma and neighbor and brother and family when he spent most of his time under my chair in the dining room while he took part in a dinner party for my Gramma and he was so good, inside my house of all places! It only took me half a day to bond with Tango and for me, that was very special. He was practically my dog when his owner finally returned. And it was hard to say goodbye that day but in my mind, I would see him soon. About two weeks later, right before I had planned to meet his mom and Tango in Woodside to visit with him and 'say goodbye' to him, I got a new email from his owner with a really wonderful note describing him and his life and she told me that they had put him down the day before, that he was in too much pain and there just wasn't anything worth doing. I cried all day and night and off and on for the next week or so. I'm still very sad and it took me almost a month to load the pictures from my camera onto my laptop to be able to look at pictures of him without loosing it. Here are my favorites that I took, the only pictures that I have of Tango: R.I.P. Tango

The next pet sitting job was for my friend M in San Jose. Crash is such a great dog and one of my new buddies. He is so great that halfway through our first long amount of time with each other, we bonded so well that I secretly wished he was my dog. I've never felt that strongly about that feeling with any other pet I have cared for, whether it was a friend's pet or not. The story about how we bonded is very cute: I had met him previously but it had been months so I doubt he remembered much since we didn't have a chance to play before. I came in the house to greet him and he was really shy and nervous, with his tail between his legs:( I got him to come to me with all the treats I found in the kitchen and I sat on the floor in the kitchen so he could get to know me on his terms. He walked around and sniffed me a bit, then when I saw his confidence, I started talking to him and finally he sat right down beside me and it was then that I just wrapped my arms around him and squeezed and he nearly exploded with excitement. It was so cute, I was laughing and expressing positive noises in his presence. He was suddenly so happy and just wanted to play with me and shower me with kisses, which is what I got. He snuggled together in bed, he would wake me in the morning by watching me and he has such a unique personality, it's like he was once human. He's got a big sturdy, long body with a vicious tail that likes to wag and knock things off tables as he walks by! He also reminds me of the guy in Zoolander, especially because he does the same 'pose' with his head as he whips it around to look you in the eyes. It's so incredibly funny to see! I tried to capture it below. There is also a picture that I caught of him in my front seat in the car. I had let him outside to walk around with me while I packed the car, getting ready to head home and after 5 minutes, I suddenly couldn't find him. I found him in the driver's seat, curled up, not wanting to get out and as if to say, 'where you go, I go'! He's my new fave and I can't wait to take care of him next. I will get to take him with me to the Bark in the Park Festival in San Jose on Sept 20th. Can't wait for that.

Here are a couple pics taken with Crash and Goldie. Goldie is the Collie/Aussie Shepard that I walk 3x week and she is one of my faves as well, obviously we have a special bond, as her mom calls me her 'best friend'. Crash really liked Goldie a lot and even affectionately let her play with his ball. She was running and chasing the ball and would carry it around in her mouth. And she's not even a 'ball dog' which is funny! Happy Dogs!!!:)

Two weeks ago I found out that my Aunt on my dad's side has breast cancer, and a scary type at that. It's one that is in the form of a large tumor, in her left breast, inside the milk duct! It was never a lump that she felt so when she went in for her yearly mammogram, they saw something on the films and requested she get a biopsy done. It now appears that it has been growing inside of her for 10 years. Fuck! :( So I've been in such shock and just haven't been sleeping well for a few nights on and off. I've known of several women who have gotten this disease but not actual close family members or close friends and no one that has gotten such an advanced case of it Originally when they discovered it on the film, it was thought that it had already spread to all of her lymph nodes, not just the ones in her left breast. It is just devastating! I didn't' get much done last week and was just thinking good thoughts. She had surgery last week on my brother's birthday, to remove the 22 swollen/infected lymph nodes under her left arm and to remove a good chunk of breast tissue under the left to get all the margins as well as the same amount on the right side just as backup. Don't want to have to go back in later. She stayed in the hospital for two nights and was back home on Friday. She was in a bed for a bit, with a very sore left armpit and places where the tissue was removed. At least she was on lots of nice drugs! Both cousins K and G went down to Newport Beach for that weekend when Ka got home from the hospital. Today she finally got the results back from her biopsy on the stuff that was removed and thank goddess, her excellent surgeon got all of the margins and the equal amounts on the right side so all of the tumor has been removed completely. Yay! She is in really good spirits as of right now and is thinking very positively I'm sure. :) We all feel much better about all of this now. I think G and K are still there and Gr is supposed to be up this coming weekend I believe. Now she just has to get through Chemo, having her hair fall out and radiation. Obviously this can be pretty rough too but she feels lucky to be past the part where you keep waiting on news.

Other news, include: Kineivel turned 5 on August 9th. I still remember today seeing him on that curb on the side of the road and watching C catch him and scooping him up in my arms, listening to his tiny purr. He is the purrmeister today, as his purr has different tones but I was woken yesterday by his loud, impressive purrs, as he exclaimed his excitement that it had finally cooled off weather wise and he could go back to taking naps that resemble hibernation under the fuzzy fleece horse blanket that is on my bed.

*It is now official!!! I am moving to Portland for sure, sometime around the end of January. I promised my loyal pet sitting clients that I would stay here through the holidays so that they could plan their holidays and I also have one last job beginning of Jan. I will for sure be having a great big 'Going Away' party/bash and you'll get invites in December sometime! I'm looking at housing now and I will be in Portland from October 7th until the morning of the 12th. I'm taking advantage of flying, since I can't drive that far alone and I just want to get there, instead of doing a drive that takes all day and night. I can't wait, as it is much needed and I need to look at some housing options and visit with friends/new friends. :)

Why I refuse to watch The Dog Whisperer

2008-08-28T03:01:00.000-07:00

Some people, mostly my mom and a few friends, know how strongly I feel about the guy in the show called The Dog Whisperer. I would hope that any kind, caring animal lover who watches or has watched this show, would be intelligent enough to realize that Millans' training techniques are inhumane and very cruel. The fact that thousands of so-called animal lovers and owners watch the show and praise the techniques used on the show, makes me incredibly upset and I usually just walk away if someone brings the show up. I have tried countless times to convince people that the show is only doing harm and it's teaching people to be cruel to their animals and cause them pain as a way of getting them to listen, to become scared of their owners. And after I have explained how the techniques used on the show were wrong and people were being misinformed about proper, humane ways of fixing behaviors and training problems, they will often brush me off and go on and on talking about how wonderful Ceser Millan is. Please! Gag me with a spoon. Are you serious???

So I was very happy when I found this article today, written by American Humane, which is an amazing organization who protects the rights of animals and children and goes out of their way to educate the public about cruel and inhumane treatments. They oversee filming laws in movies and videos that use animals and children, they advocate adoption and they are the people responsible for implementing emergency animal rescue relief in times of crisis, like when Hurricane Katrina stuck New Orleans. In September 2006 they wrote this article to the National Geographic channel, asking them to cancel the show. Here is what they wrote:

'Dog Whisperer' Training Approach More Harmful Than Helpful

Denver (September 6, 2006)

The training tactics featured on Cesar Millan's “Dog Whisperer” program are inhumane, outdated and improper, according to a letter sent yesterday to the National Geographic Channel by American Humane, the oldest national organization protecting children and animals.

In the letter, American Humane, which works to raise public awareness about responsible pet ownership and reduce the euthanasia of unwanted pets, expressed dismay over the “numerous inhumane training techniques” advocated by Cesar Millan on “Dog Whisperer.”

Several instances of cruel and dangerous treatment -- promoted by Millan as acceptable training methods -- were documented by American Humane, including one in which a dog was partially asphyxiated in an episode. In this instance, the fractious dog was pinned to the ground by its neck after first being “hung” by a collar incrementally tightened by Millan. Millan’s goal -- of subduing a fractious animal -- was accomplished by partially cutting off the blood supply to its brain.

The letter requests that National Geographic stop airing the program immediately and issue a statement explaining that the tactics featured on the program are inhumane, and it encourages National Geographic to begin developing programming that sets a positive example by featuring proper, humane animal training. In its letter, American Humane said: “We believe that achieving the goal of improving the way people interact with their pets would be far more successful and beneficial for the National Geographic Channel if it ceased sending the contradictory message that violent treatment of animals is acceptable.”

“As a forerunner in the movement towards humane dog training, we find the excessively rough handling of animals on the show and inhumane training methods to be potentially harmful for the animals and the people on the show,” said the letter’s author, Bill Torgerson, DVM, MBA, who is vice president of Animal Protection Services for American Humane. “It also does a disservice to all the show’s viewers by espousing an inaccurate message about what constitutes effective training and appropriate treatment of animals.”

Torgerson noted that the safety of a woman and her German shepherd were jeopardized in one episode by the use of an electric shock collar, which forced the tormented dog to redirect its aggression at its owner, biting her arm. “Furthermore, the television audience was never told that Mr. Millan was attempting to modify the dog’s behavior by causing pain with the shock collar,” he said.

What you read above has not been blown out of proportion, rather when the show first came out, as always when something animal related comes out, I sat down to watch it in hopes that I would be learning some new methods of animal training that I could apply in my own workings with dogs in my life and in my pet sitting business. But unfortunately I was appalled! I remember tears streaming down my cheeks and getting very angry and I didn't even watch the entire show. I got up, left the room and emailed The National Geographic channel about my thoughts and something about 'how dare they show a program that tells people it is okay to be cruel to their dogs. I never heard back from them but I also never watched the show again and I believe that by not supporting the show, I am making a difference. Now I just want to spread the word about the show and try to get the show pulled. So while this article was written 2 years ago, by us bombarding the channel website with emails, it would really help I think to bring this issue back to the present and advocate the cancellation of The Dog Whisperer.

Now and again, I talk to people and when I first met Heather and her dog Gracie - who happens to be a Katrina rescue dog - she asked me my opinion of The Dog Whisperer. I frowned and carefully told her my thoughts. To my surprise, she agreed with me. She told me about the show that she had first seen and that it was a case where the dog was scared of other dogs because it had had no social interaction with other dogs as a puppy and apparently the owner couldn't take her dog anyplace where other dogs were. In the show, when nothing else worked, Millan proceeded to use force to try to 'scare' the dog into submission. I had tried to wipe my memory of that show, but as it turns out, this was actually the episode that I had watched as well, so Heather told me what happened. Millan put this dog into a little fenced area, about 4 feet in circumference so the dog was trapped there and had no way of escaping. Dogs who have been abused should never be left trapped like that. Then he let loose about 5 or 6 different dogs, I think a few were his and the dogs just started barking at the dog in the fence and circling him and this poor dog was whimpering and just got down on the ground because there was nothing else he could do. He had the shit scared out of him and he was probably scarred for life after that incident. Millan proceeded to praise the dogs that were outside of the fence, for their behavior and he praised the dog inside the cage for submitting to Millan and his technique. Then he had the owner walk the dog over to another dog, both on leashes. This poor dogs' response was to immediately get down on the ground and cower, not making eye contact or acknowledging that there was another dog in its presence. Watching that made me so extremely sad and I was just appalled at the fact that they - whoever they is - would allow such a thing to be shown on public TV. But of course, I'm blown away by a lot of things that are shown on TV, even just basic cable. But don't get me started on that tangent.

So if you want to be a part of this cause, you can email National Geographic and tell them what you think of the show and why you want the show canceled. It makes a bigger difference when lots of people get together and contact a TV channel to get their opinions heard. So if you care, please take the time to do so.

National Geographics' contact info is: http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/contact. There is a form that you fill out. If you want to contact Millan himself and tell him how you feel about what he does, go here: http://www.cesarmillaninc.com/contact/. Thank you!

Michael Phelps is my new hero!

2008-08-18T19:15:00.000-07:00

For those of you not watching the Olympics - and if you aren't, WHY??? - you are so missing out! Our country rocks the summer olympics this year. We have done so well. But I am happy to say that because of the Olympics I have a new hero - Michael Phelps. Not just because he's just done the impossible - won 8 gold medals in one Olympics and broken 8 world records in each of his 8 events. But because he is an amazing swimmer and he swims a lot like I do, at least in freestyle, with his shoulders up out of the water and leaves a powerful wake behind him. It has been so awesome and mind blowing watching him swim LIVE on TV and win so many things - plus out two men's relay teams did amazingly well and also broke world records in both of those events. At one relay, we were half a pool's length ahead of the rest of the field. Just amazing!

Here is a list of his medals:

Men's Swimming
Competitor for Flag of the United States United States
Olympic Games
Gold 2004 Athens 100 m butterfly
Gold 2004 Athens 200 m butterfly
Gold 2004 Athens 200 m individual medley
Gold 2004 Athens 400 m individual medley
Gold 2004 Athens 4 x 200 m freestyle relay
Gold 2004 Athens 4 x 100 m medley relay
Gold 2008 Beijing 200 m freestyle
Gold 2008 Beijing 100 m butterfly
Gold 2008 Beijing 200 m butterfly
Gold 2008 Beijing 200 m individual medley
Gold 2008 Beijing 400 m individual medley
Gold 2008 Beijing 4 x 100 m freestyle relay
Gold 2008 Beijing 4 x 200 m freestyle relay
Gold 2008 Beijing 4 x 100 m medley relay
Bronze 2004 Athens 200 m freestyle
Bronze 2004 Athens 4 x 100 m freestyle relay

Here's a link to news on his 8th Gold Medal. So cool!!! http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/08/17/sports/OLYPHELPS.php?WT.mc_id=glob_mrktg_lnk1&WT.mc_ev=click

Here is a news video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emzsB1b2cWw

And lastly, on this site, under Swimming, you can watch Phelps win all 8 Golds! http://www.nbcolympics.com/racefortherecord/

:)

Recent California fires

2008-08-13T19:11:00.001-07:00

These are a collection of shots taken during the recent Calif fires. So sad how much has burned and has prevented me and others from going camping as well as canceling many different endurance rides :(

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2008/07/californias_continuing_fires.html

Glad they are starting to go out!

Please help America's race horses!

2008-06-16T15:21:00.001-07:00

*I was sent this via email. Please read it over and please sign the petition to help race horses!*

America's Race Horses Need Protection

Every year, hundreds of race horses suffer career ending and even fatal injuries on race tracks across the country. The recent, high-profile deaths of Eight Belles and Barbaro put a spotlight on the high risk faced by these majestic animals, who are literally "run to death" in some cases. Take action to protect America's race horses.

Currently, only a handful of states ban the use of steroids in horse racing, but most states do not. Decisions regarding track surfaces, young horses racing while their bones are still developing, and other horse welfare concerns are made on a state-by-state basis, resulting in widely varying degrees of protection across our country.

Fortunately, Congress is considering the formation of a national commission to address these concerns and provide uniform regulation of the horse racing industry.

TAKE ACTION
Please make a brief, polite phone call to your U.S. Representative, Pete Stark, at (202) 225-5065 to urge support for a national commission to protect our race horses.

When you call, you will likely speak to a staff member who will pass your message along to your legislator. Remember to be polite and professional, and leave your name and address so it is clear that you are a constituent. You can say:

"Hello, my name is [your name] and I am calling from [your city] to ask Representative Stark to support the formation of a national commission to oversee horse racing. Thank you."

After making your call, please send a follow-up email to Congress in support of national oversight of the horse racing industry. And don't forget to tell your friends and family how they can protect horses, too.

Go online and sign the petition: https://community.hsus.org/campaign/FED_2008_horseracing/5ubuu3r07wddn5w?

Thank you for all you do for animals.

Sincerely,

Mike Markarian
Executive Vice President
The Humane Society of the United States

Pain medications and 'addiction fears'

2008-06-14T00:58:00.000-07:00

This is an issue that hits close to home for me, as family and friends have long since continued to express fear about my pain meds or the amounts that I sometimes have to take, as being an issue later on and possibly causing me to be addicted to them. Due to this 'fear of addiction' I have met many people, including family members & friends, who are in so much pain that they should be on regular pain meds but refuse to take them because they are scared of becoming 'addicted' to their prescribed medications. Not only does this do more harm in the body, but it puts those people in great amounts of stress and ultimately makes them worse in the long run. I'm a big advocate of trying to educated the public and also ignorant medical professionals about the fact that those in pain need the meds that helps the pain and their medication access should never be taken away because of some stereotype that has been placed on pain meds. Your doctor knows what is best for you and when he/she prescribes a powerful pain relief medication, it's for a reason. As long as you take your medication as directed, as I do, you're going to be fine. This also applies to those who may have the so-called 'addictive personality' running in their family; I don't believe that this causes a higher risk for addiction to pain medications or any other medications. People who are in real pain are not trying to get 'high' from their medications, they are getting relief for their pain. Research has shown that even people who have suffered long term chronic pain, sometimes most of their lives, are able to slowly go off of their medications under the direction of their doctors and then they don't need the medication anymore because they are not in the same amount of pain when they have gotten much better. Please read the following article, which has new research about this same issue. Please don't listen to every stereotype that you hear of and rather try to think for yourself, get the facts before you judge. This article includes great information about how to prevent addiction and how medical doctors should always watch their patients closely for any signs of oncoming addictive behaviors. When asked, I explain to people that yes I'm on some very powerful pain meds, some every day and other on an as-needed basis but I also have to see my doctor once every 3 months in order to obtain new prescriptions for those medications. So my doctor is constantly monitoring my progress and we discuss everything that is going on with me at each appointment. This is so important for the pain patient. So if you are in pain and are considering asking your doctor about pain medications, don't be afraid to ask. Tell your doctor your concerns around addiction and how to prevent it. Don't ever hide those types of fears from your doctor. He/she is there to help you and to provide the care and treatments you need to get better and to be in less pain. Thank you!

Whitney :)

Chronic Pain Meds Unlikely to Cause Addiction
By MedHeadlines • May 9th, 2008 • Category: Drugs, Headlines, Medical Research, Neurology, Pain

The general population and many in the medical community alike harbor the popular opinion that using strong pain medications, including opioids, for long-term, chronic pain puts the patient at high risk of developing an addiction to the pain medications. A report presented recently at the annual meeting of the American Pain Society (APS) reveals evidence to the contrary.

pain medsSrinivasa Raja, MD, a professor of anesthesiology at Johns Hopkins University Medical School, reports that less than 3% of all patients suffering from chronic pain and who have no history of abusing drugs of any kind may eventually show signs of dependence or abuse when taking these medications pain relief. He urged the medical community to keep this very small percentage of risk in mind when establishing policies for prescribing such medications to patients who are far more likely to benefit from them than be endangered by them.

Raja also points to media attention surrounding an increase in the abuse of such medications but says these drugs are easily obtained from unregulated internet pharmacies and through theft and forgery of prescriptions, not just from within the legitimate medical establishment. While the established medical community is not the sole source of supply for these medications, Raja urges diligent communication between physician and patient, with patient screening procedures to identify addictive or potentially abusive behaviors becoming a routine part of the prescription and follow-up phases of treatment.

Raja further calls for uniformity in state and federal drug regulations and praises the teen drug awareness campaigns underway across the country as a means of preventing abuse of this type of drug. Raja says collaboration from the healthcare community, law enforcement agencies, and the pharmaceutical industry is needed to ensure people who need them will be allowed continued access to these medications, especially in the many cases where the benefits far exceed the risk of dependency.

Alternative treatments such as cognitive behavior and physical therapies should be used to supplement pain medications whenever possible, according to Raja. He says using this multi-faceted approach to pain management is much more effective than relying only on pain medications as the sole means of relief in most cases.

In his address to the APS, Raja cited past beliefs about pain that have been disproved by scientific evidence, such as that babies didn’t feel pain and therefore didn’t need anesthesia and that cancer patients should eschew the most potent and effective pain medications due to the supposed risk of addiction. These outdated beliefs have been proven wrong and he feels the fear of addiction should be abandoned as well in favor of effective treatment for pain management without the stigma of potential addiction influencing treatment options.

Source: American Pain Society

I know it's been a while - the impact of not being believed!

2008-03-10T18:58:00.000-07:00

I know i haven't posted in a while. A lot of things have been happening in my life, mostly good but some bad too. As is life!

Currently I'm struggling to live at home, mostly because my mom has once again decided NOT to believe how much pain I suffer from every single day. H says to take her words with a grain of salt but it's still hard and it still hurts! Ever had a parent break your heart? Then you know what I'm talking about. She says my pain and other symptoms are just 'excuses'. Well they aren't and I'm not sure how much more of this crap I can take from her. I don't want to push my move to Portland but I don't know what else to do. I can't live like this. I've started avoiding my own house! How fucked up is that!?! I really thought we were getting along but because I don't live my life the way she thinks I should, with her rules and her schedule - gee, sorry mom, I have my own life! and I'm 30 years old or did you forget that!?! So I'm considering either a) finding a bunch of overnight housesitting jobs on the Peninsula, to be close to my new friend CR there and her horses that I get to ride and that is helping more than I ever thought it would. Or find housing in exchange for pet sitting, which may happen in a couple of months too. Or b) save as fast as I can, ignore my mom, which is hard to do, relish the times that she is gone and deal with it the best that I can or just not be home very often and then move to Portland as soon as I can, which right now won't be until end of this year or beginning of 2009. Need to save 1st, last and pet deposit anyway, so i figure $1500 at least and also talk to J to see if she will consider Portland instead of Seattle and be my roommate :)

On another bad note, I found out that my best friend J, who lives near Seattle has to have surgery, which she had last week, for a grapefruit sized cyst that she had on an ovary. She's okay, though she lost the right one and is just taking forever to heal. She also has Fibro plus MPS and some other issues. So she's better and I didn't need to go visit her but I was quite concerned for about two weeks.

And on top of all of that, I'm also now dealing with the upsetting reality of the memory of something that happened to me over two years ago now. I didn't tell anyone about it, which I know is dumb. We, as women, always say that if such and such ever happens to us, that we'd be able to report it or tell soemone about it right away, even if it means getting someone you thought you liked or cared about hauled off to jail. Well for some reason, I dealt with it by hiding, keeping my mouth shut out of fear and then blocking it from my memory. It ruined my relationship with the only person I've ever loved and will always love, becuase I couldn't tell him, because of a stupid fear that he wouldn't believe me (even though that fear was realistic at the time); my parents and closest friends don't even know. I see movies about it all the time and ask myself why?! It's weird when you literally block a memory. But now it's been coming back and last night I had a nightmare about it, woke up in a cold sweat, alone. Then spent all of today in tears and dealing with being super anxious. Of course, it doesn't help that I'm low on Effexxor and can't get more until Wed. I can't afford to see my therapist right now so that makes the situation almost impossible to deal with. I think I need to tell my closest friends who are girls - not that I have any guy friends anymore anyway - but I need to just get it out, have someone show me that they believe me. And then go from there! I wish this feeling on no one. But I felt that I needed to write this here, to get it out.

Here is an article I just found, regarding the impact of how it feels and how it makes pain patients or anyone feel, when someone doesn't believe you:

The Impact of Not Being Believed
Monday March 3, 2008

"I just wish someone would believe me!"

How often have you said or thought that? Disbelief or skepticism about fibromyalgia (FMS) and chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS or ME/CFS) is something most of us are all too familiar with, and if you've experienced it yourself, you don't need a study to tell you how painful it can be.

Wouldn't it be great, though, if someone would tell your doctors how detrimental it is for them to dismiss your pain? I was delighted to see a chronic pain study out of Wales that does tell them. (While this study was only on chronic pain, I don't think it's a stretch to say the findings would apply to fatigue and other "invisible" symptoms.)

Of a group of 8 people in the study, only 2 said they had no problem getting health-care workers to accept their word on pain, and those two people also had visible disabilities. Stories from the other 6 included doctors denying pain medication, shouting at them for taking more pain killers than prescribed, and even blatantly saying, "I don't believe you," and walking out.

Those actions left them with feelings that (no surprise to us!) included anger frustration, isolation, depression and thoughts of suicide.

The study concludes that doctors and other health professionals just need to believe what their patients say when it comes to pain, bringing up a definition of pain coined 40 years ago by Margo McCaffery, a chronic-pain nursing consultant: "Pain is whatever the experiencing person says it is, existing whenever the experiencing person says it does." The logic is simple, but the implications to our treatment would be profound.

The final paragraph sums up what practitioners can do to avoid all these problems:

These simple means are: active listening; being non-judgemental; accepting the pain experience as credible as recounted by patients; and thus showing to patients that the relationship is based on caring and empathy. While these may be considered mundane and accepted practice, it is vitally important not to overlook the impact they have on patients with chronic pain.

New Honda Accord commercial - purely awesome!

2008-01-13T18:28:00.000-08:00

If you thought that the people who set up a room full of dominoes to have them knocked over later was amazing, you haven't seen anything yet..

There are no computer graphics or digital tricks in these images. Everything that you see happened in real time exactly as you see it..

The recording required 606 takes and in the first 605 takes there always was something, usually of minor importance, that didn't work. It was necessary for the recording team to install the set-up time after time and it took several weeks working day and night to achieve this effect.

The recording cost 6 million dollars and it took 3 months to finish, including the engineering design of the sequence.

The duration of the video is only 2 minutes, but every time that Honda shows the commercial on British television, they make enough money to support any of us for the rest of our lives. However, this commercial has turned out to be the most displayed in the history of the Internet.

Honda execs think that it will pay for itself simply because of the free showings (Honda is not paying one cent for you to see it)

When Honda senior execs viewed it, they immediately approved it without hesitation - including costs.

There are only six Honda Accords built by hand in the whole world, and to the horror of Honda engineers, the recording team disassembled two of them for the recording.

Everything you see in the sequence (besides the walls, floor, ramp and untouched Honda Accord) is part of those two automobiles. The voice is
that of Garrison Keiller. The commercial was so well received by Honda execs when they saw it, that their first comment was how amazing the computer graphics were. They almost fell out of their chairs when told t hat the recording was real without any graphics manipulation. < BR>
By the way , about the wind shield wipers in the new Honda Accords, they are sensitive to water and designed to start working as soon as they get wet. Check out the video below:

2007 Darwin Awards!!

2008-01-13T18:26:00.000-08:00

These are always so amusing. It is nature taking care of the stupid people. Just classic. I love to read these when they come out. And, of course, the first one is just downright deserving!!

http://darwinawards.com/darwin/

Enjoy!!

Things that make me happy! - Part 1

2008-01-08T00:19:00.000-08:00

SWEET!!!! I am so excited. I don't think anyone knows this but for years I've had my eye out for anyone 'preferably' giving away rather than selling, back issues of OMNI - which is one of my all time favorite magazines from my past. I think I was in high school when they stopped publishing and that was a very bad day for me, I remember it well. So I subscribe to Freecycle - Alameda and East Bay area. Sometimes people who don't live in the East Bay still post their items on that list and I don't always check it because of that - there have been times where I wanted to get an item but that meant going out to Pittsburg or some other boon-dock type place.

Fortunately I looked at the post from yesterday and, what do you know, there's a couple in Pacifica giving away 4 huge boxes of their entire collection of OMNI. It would have meant me driving all the way to Pacifica, which I was willing to do because it would have been worth the trip, but now it looks like I'll be able to meet the wife at her place of work in Oakland. I am so incredibly psyched!! I am a huge sci-fi and real science fan, not to mention that for those of us who truly believe in the paranormal, this was THE magazine for you. Unfortunately I still have yet to come across anything that can be compared to it today :(. So, in a few days, I will be the proud owner of a collection of OMNI magazines. I will not be scrap booking these, unless some are in un-collectable condition but hope to keep most as my own personal collection. I am really excited to re-start my own research on some particular subjects, and read the information that OMNI exclusively put out on those topics in their issues, many of which, I never got to read. This wasn't tabloid type material, this was pure truth for real believers + excellent reading material from some really fabulous sci-fi writers. For those interested in knowing more, here is the information I pulled up from Wiki:

Omni (magazine)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

OMNI was both a science magazine and science fiction magazine. It contained articles on science fact and short works of science fiction. The first issue was published in October 1978, the last in Winter 1995, with an Internet version lasting until 1998. Bob Guccione described the magazine in its first issue as "an original if not controversial mixture of science fact, fiction, fantasy and the paranormal"[1]

History

OMNI was launched by Kathy Keeton Guccione, wife of Penthouse magazine publisher Bob Guccione, and edited by Ben Bova from 1978 until 1981. Before launch it was referred to as Nova, but the name was changed before the first issue to avoid a conflict with the PBS science show of the same name, NOVA.[2] After Bova left, Editors of OMNI included Richard Teresi, Gurney Williams III, Patrice Adcroft, Keith Ferrell, and Pamela Weintraub (editor of OMNI Internet). Kathleen Stein managed the magazine's prestigious Q&A interviews with the top scientists of the 20th century through 1998. Ellen Datlow was fiction editor of OMNI from the time Bova stepped down in 1981 until the magazine folded in 1998 and Sherry Baker was the Continuum editor, now working as a freelance editor and writer in Atlanta, Georgia. The very first edition had an exclusive interview with renowned physicist, Freeman Dyson, the second edition with American writer and futurist, Alvin Toffler.

OMNI developed a dual personality during its life. In its early run, its high circulation (permitting payment for stories many times higher than that of other science fiction magazines), coupled with some outstanding fiction editors, allowed it to attract prominent speculative fiction writers, and it published a number of stories that have become genre classics, such as Orson Scott Card's "Unaccompanied Sonata", William Gibson's "Burning Chrome" including Johnny Mnemonic" and George R. R. Martin's "The Way of Cross and Dragon". The magazine also serialized Stephen King's novel Firestarter, and featured a short story, "The End of the Whole Mess". OMNI also brought the works of numerous painters to the attention of a large audience, such as H.R. Giger and De Es Schwertberger.

The bulk of the magazine, meanwhile, profiled science and scientists with a visionary, gonzo-style science journalism rooted in story-telling, credibility, and authorial voice. OMNI's Q&A Interviews constituted a collective oral history of 20th-century science told by the world's greatest thinkers in areas from evolutionary biology to chaos theory to space. OMNI celebrated science with an edgy entertaining patter and irreverence. OMNI 's pro-technology orientation has been compared to the later magazine Wired.

OMNI entered the market at the start of a wave of new science magazines aimed at educated but otherwise "non-professional" readers. Science Digest and Science News already served the high-school market, and Scientific American and New Scientist the professional, while OMNI was arguably the first aimed at "armchair scientists" who were nevertheless well informed about technical issues. The next year, however, Time introduced Discover while the AAAS introduced Science '80. Advertising dollars were spread between the different magazines, and those without deep pockets soon folded in the early 1980s, notably Science Digest, while Science '80 merged with Discover. OMNI appeared to weather this storm better than most, likely due to its wider selection of contents.

In its later years, especially the last year or two of the print publication, OMNI was criticized for weighting its coverage more toward pseudo-scientific topics like UFOs and ESP. Some have speculated that this may have been an effort to increase circulation during leaner years, but the strategy backfired. Though OMNI 's treatment of these topics was essentially skeptical, the weighting nonetheless damaged its credibility and led, in part, to its demise. Guccione shut down the print version of the magazine following the Winter 1995 issue due to waning popularity and the many financial difficulties plaguing his company, General Media.

After the print magazine folded in 1996, the OMNI Internet webzine was launched. Free of pressure to focus on fringe science areas, OMNI returned to its roots as the home of gonzo science writing, becoming one of the first large-scale venues to deliver a journalism geared specifically to cyberspace, complete with real-time coverage of major science events, chats and blogs with scientific luminaries, and interactive experiments that users could join. The world's top science fiction writers also joined in, writing collaborative fiction pieces for OMNI's readers live online. *You can see the website and updated blog here: http://www.omnimagonline.com

Though the website generated large traffic, it did not turn a profit. In 1998, Kathy Keeton, whose vision inspired OMNI, died from complications of breast cancer, the staff of OMNI Internet was laid off, and no new content was added to the website. General Media shut the site down and removed the OMNI archives from the Internet in 2003.

TV

A short-lived syndicated television show based on the magazine's format (and called OMNI: The New Frontier) aired in the United States beginning in September 1981, hosted by Peter Ustinov. A French voice over of the show appeared on "Radio Québec" in Canada during 1994.

References in Popular Culture

* In The Fly, Stathis threatens to send Veronica's teleportation story to OMNI -- his own publication, PARTICLE magazine, created for the film, is a clear nod to OMNI.

* In the 1989 romantic film Say Anything, Diane Court has an issue in her bedroom next to her desk. There is also an issue visible in the garbage can in the background when James Court is sitting in the bathtub after having his credit cards declined.

* In Ghostbusters, the Proton Pack appears on a fictional front cover of the magazine.

* In 2010: The Year We Make Contact, a future OMNI issue appeared in front of Roy Scheider on the beach.

* In Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, a fellow passenger can be seen reading OMNI magazine on the bus that Kirk and Spock take across the Golden Gate Bridge.

* On the 2005 album Robot Hive/Exodus by the band Clutch, the song "Mice and Gods" references OMNI Magazine in the very first line of the song.

* In the film Jurassic Park, Tim Murphy mentions having read an article by Alan Grant in Omni magazine.

Part 2 coming soon!!!!

Resource for free chronic pain & relaxation guidance podcasts

2008-01-06T23:14:00.000-08:00

I just found this wonderful resource and I really think it could benefit anyone like myself who cannot really do meditation without being guided. I have checked out this link, the site and the podcasts and they are free and legit. I hope they help anyone in any type of chronic pain OR just for those who need to learn how to relax!

Hi

My name is Jason Newland and I provide free relaxation and chronic
pain relief services online.
On my website I have free video and audios that anyone can listen to
and download, anywhere in the world.
All my services are completely free and I am not gaining
financially, whatsoever.

I now have 19 free audio sessions for relaxation & chronic pain
relief

Please visit my website:

www.jasonnewland.com

to watch or listen to my free videos and audios for relaxation and
Chronic pain relief

Video Session 1 - Relaxation Session - 180207

Video Session 2 - Relaxation Session - 170307

Video Session 3 - 10 minute Relaxation Session - 150407

Video Session 4 - 10 minute Relaxation Session - 250407

Video Session 5 - Relaxation Session - 120607

Video Session 6 - 10 minute chronic pain relief technique 1

Video Session 7 - 10 minute chronic pain relief technique 2

Audio Session 1 - Relaxation Session - 150107

Audio Session 2 - Body Awareness Session - 200107

Audio Session 3 - Relaxation Session - 090207

Audio Session 4 - Relaxation Session - 120207

Audio Session 5 - Relaxation Session - 160207

Audio Session 6 - Short Relaxation Session - 050207

Audio Session 7 - Short Relaxation Session - 010307

Audio Session 8 - Chronic Pain Relief Session - 190207

Audio Session 9 - Chronic Pain Relief Session - 120207

Audio Session 10 - Short Chronic Pain Relief Session -190207

Audio Session 11 - Short Chronic Pain Relief Session - 250207

Audio Session 12 - Relaxation Session - 120607

Audio Session 13 - Long Relaxation Session - 040608

Audio Session 14 - Relaxation Session - 110607

Audio Session 15 - Relaxation Session - 140607

Audio Session 16 - Relaxation Session - 120807

Audio Session 17 - Chronic Pain Relief Session - 061107

Audio Session 18 - Chronic Pain Relief Session - 251107

Audio Session 19 - Chronic Pain Relief Session - 301207

Thank you very much

love Jason Newland x

www.jasonnewland.com

jasonnewland@hotmail.co.uk

myspace.com/buddhistjay

First scary storm of 2008!

2008-01-04T02:20:00.000-08:00

For those in the bay area, you're probably asleep right now. But I am wide awake! I can't sleep - I love listening to the wind and the rain, actually more like waiting to hear the rain. I got some driving home from Carmel earlier today but it wasn't too heavy as is predicted. What is heavy though is the wind. You see, I live right on the water, on the bay and that makes for much different weather experiences, especially when we get a 'storm of the century' as they are calling it in the paper. It is much more windy here - we've so far gotten up to 72 knots (which is close to 70mph) and it's currently gusting at 60+ with winds at 55 or so blowing strong. I was asleep for a while but then awakened by a loud crash. I thought, oh god, what now?! My cat ran under the bed and I went downstairs to investigate. I discovered our boat, now off of the dock and in the water. Thank goodness my dad had it locked with a long steel wire lock. It was the only thing securing it to the dock. I managed to grab the bowline and tie that to the dock as well. I also almost got blown off the dock! Yikes! I'm now back up in bed, listening to the neighbors' boats bang around, every crash sounds like it may be the last time they see their boats in one piece. And good ridence too - they are evil people and never use their boats, they've just been sitting in the water, rotting for years, taking up wasted dock space and partially blocking our view of our little marina. Thankfully everything on our end is secured and boy am I glad I did come home today. I wanted to stay another day but once again my parents started to drive me crazy, so I decided that 5 days without them at home sounded like a much better bargain. Once again, I save the day :) Hope everyone else out there is faring better.

An example of how intelligent my cat is!

2008-01-02T12:52:00.001-08:00

I'm currently in Carmel for New Years and to try to have a few more vacation days until I head back home, although my grouchy parents aren't making it very easy. I wanted to stay an extra day, more than I had originally planned, because I just love it down here and this year the owners of the house aren't returning until end of January. So when I got back from my trip to Oregon, I stopped off at home for the evening, slept on the couch with my kitty, since being in my room would have been way too depressing anyway. I have been trying to teach my cat how to open doors for himself and it never occured to me that this would pose any issues down the road. Another bad thing about temporarily living with the folks, is that they are very insistent that my kitty stay in the laundry room/garage if I'm going to be gone overnight. Of course, when they are not home at all, I don't do this because it's not really fair. And I would have just given him the run of the house this time except I did not know until yesterday that my parents are going to be staying in Carmel a week longer than usual. So all of last night, I thought, damn, wish I could have known that earlier. My cat really needs room to run around and act all psycho and crazy when he is in that particular mood. So as painful as it was, I left him in the laundry room and garage, with blankets on the hood of my car in the garage and his bed up on the washer - to give him more options as to where to sleep, off the cold floor. I left plenty of food + his automatic waterer too and asked a neighbor to come by and check on him a couple of times.

So I just a few minutes ago called to check in. Turns out she went over yesterday, to find the door to the laundry room open - she said I must have left it open, but I didn't. Turns out Kitty opened it himself. My dad beginning of last year installed all new door handles all over the house, the kind that are like a lever, so a cat could potentially reach up and pull on the handle to open the door. I don't know how he did it, because the door swings into the laundry room, not the opposite but he must have known to do that. Smart kitty! Now I'm a bit more happy, not so much worried about him being stuck in the garage area. I asked her to make sure to leave that door open as all of his food, water and litter box are currently in the garage too and I don't want to come home to find any accidents. But I'm just kinda laughing inside at the moment. I am so proud of my kitty. What a smart cat!!!

Free for pet owners!

2008-01-01T23:27:00.000-08:00

Everyone who owns pets should have access to this. A rescue window decal is especially important for your home or wherever your pets reside. The ASPCA is such a great resource and this is their latest offer this year!

In the event of an emergency, this pet rescue window decal from the ASPCA (American Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) alerts rescue personnel that pets are inside your home. The safety pack also includes an ASPCA Animal Poison Control Center magnet—a great way to keep the APCC's toll-free emergency number and website address handy in case your pets get into something they shouldn’t!
Free Pet Safety Pack

And when you sign up to receive your free pet safety pack, you’ll also receive emails from the ASPCA – the oldest humane organization in the western hemisphere. You’ll receive pet care tips, success stories, updates on the pet food recall, and special e-mail bulletins on how you can help lobby for animal welfare.

http://www.care2.com/campaigns/aspca/index.html?z00m=11667529

PROOF!!! Myofascial Pain is REAL

2007-12-31T01:58:00.000-08:00

Yes, people of the world, chronic myofascial pain is real. And it really fricken hurts!

Myofascial Pain — a Neuromuscular Disease

News in the World of Myofascial Pain

Life has been tough for those of us with myofascial pain syndrome. We have too often been met with doctors who “don’t believe in” CMP. We have been hampered by the lack of a scientifically credible and understandable cause for this condition and an officially recognized set of diagnostic criteria. This resulted in a lack of training of physicians and therapists. The insurance companies and the Social Security Administration made our lives even more difficult. This is about to change.

We now have facts that cannot be disputed. At last we have proof that myofascial pain caused by trigger points is a true disease. We know what creates a trigger point, what it is, and many of the ways it can cause us pain and other symptoms. We know what causes those taut bands that constrict our muscles, and we know why our muscles become so tight that they hurt.

A myofascial trigger point is a localized area starving for oxygen. It creates an increased local energy demand. This local energy crisis releases neuroreactive biochemicals which sensitize nearby nerves. The sensitized nerves initiate the motor, sensory, and autonomic effects of myofascial trigger points by acting on the central nervous system. Muscles with trigger points are muscles in a constant state of energy crisis.

Myofascial trigger points can be identified and documented electrophysiologically by characteristic spontaneous electrical activity (SEA). They may also be identified histologically (which means that the structure of the cells have changed) by contraction knots — the lumps and bumps we know only too well. Both of these phenomenon seem to result from excessive release of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine (ACh) from the nerve terminal of the motor endplate (the complex end formation of the nerve).

We now have objective confirmation of electromyographic imaging of a myofascial trigger point. There is also ultrasound imaging of local twitch responses of trigger points, and biopsies of myofascial trigger points that show contraction knots and giant rounded muscle fibers. To quote from this article, "The endplate dysfunction characteristic of MTrPs involves both the nerve terminal and the postjunctional muscle fiber. This relationship identifies MTrPs as a neuromuscular disease." Simons DG. 1999. Diagnostic criteria of myofascial pain caused by trigger points. J Musculoskeletal Pain 7(1-2):111-120.

A MTrP is always found in a taut band which is histologically related to contraction knots caused by excessive release of ACh in an abnormal endplate. The pathogenesis of myofascial trigger points appears to involve serious disturbance of the nerve ending and contractile mechanism at multiple dysfunctional endplates. Doctor Hong has even formed a theory concerning fibromyalgia tender points. Hong, C-Z. 1999. Current research on myofascial trigger points-pathophysiological studies. J Musculoskeletal Pain 7(1-2):121-129.

Please ask your librarian to obtain these articles through Interlibrary loan, and give them to your doctor. Don’t forget to keep copies for yourselves.

For more information on this issue of the Journal of Musculoskeletal Pain go to Journal of Musculoskeletal Pain from Haworth Medical Press.

Very touching video from a 15 yr old girl

2007-12-20T01:20:00.001-08:00

http://www.youtube.com/v/ervaMPt4Ha0&autoplay=1

So sad, made me tear up.

Support our troops!

Do your part to help stop global warming!

2007-12-11T02:01:00.000-08:00

This is taken from the World Wildlife Fund website. These are some great tips!

Stopping Global Warming

As pollution increases, so does the world's average temperature. Global warming forces rapid changes in human and animal habitats. Life becomes more difficult, many species will not survive. Human industries and activities produce the world's air pollution, most of it carbon dioxide and other "greenhouse" gases that result in global warming. The U.S. releases approximately 40,000 pounds of carbon dioxide per person each year.

What You Can Do

You can help stop global warming by taking these 10 steps to cut your yearly emissions of carbon dioxide by thousands of pounds.

1. Next time, buy a car that gets at least 30 miles per gallon (reduces carbon dioxide 2,500 pounds a year over a car that gets 10 mpg less.).
2. Where you can, choose an electric utility company that does not produce power from polluting sources such as fossil fuels and nuclear fission. (Enormous potential reductions in carbon dioxide emissions.)
3. Replace standard light bulbs with energy-efficient fluorescents. (Reduces emissions by 500 pounds per year light bulb.)
4. Replace worn-out home appliances with energy efficient models. (Reduces emissions by up to 3,000 pounds per year.)
5. Choose the best energy-saving models when you replace windows. (Reduces emissions up to 10,000 pounds per year.)
6. Wrap your water heater in an insulating jacket. (Reduces emissions up to 1,000 pounds per year.)
7. Install low-flow showerheads that use less water. (Reduces emissions up to 300 pounds per year.)
8. Ask your utility company for a home energy audit to pinpoint the biggest energy-wasters. (Potential reduction of thousands of pounds per year.)
9. Whenever possible, walk, bike, carpool or use mass transit. (Reduces emissions by 20 pounds for every gallon of gasoline used.)
10. Insulate walls and ceilings and save about 25% of home heating bills. (And reduce emissions by up to 2,000 pounds per year.)

Additional Resources
Energy Star Website: http://www.energystar.gov - Energy Star products use less energy than other products, save you money on utility bills, and help protect the environment.

WWF's Climate Change site provides more information, breaking news, and online actions.

Hooray to the Humane Society for all that they do! plus Kinevel pics

2007-12-11T01:42:00.000-08:00

As some of you know, animal cruelty is one thing that upsets me greatly and I really try to do what I can to help out animals who have been abused, neglected, etc. I even rescued my own kitty 4 years ago off the side of the road, at only a month old!

Follow this link to see what the Humane Society has achieved over the last few years - it really is amazing! https://community.hsus.org/humane/notice-description.tcl?newsletter_id=17640186

Here's my kitty right after we first found him:

And here he is now at 4 years old - this is actually a picture taken from my photography series entitled: Kitty and the spider :)

The Geminids are coming!!! Meteor shower next week!

2007-12-09T00:41:00.001-08:00

The Geminids Are Coming
This is an abridged version of an article that appears in the December Sky & Telescope, page 71.

Geminid meteor
A bright meteor from the 2004 Geminid meteor shower was captured with a tripod-mounted digital camera and a 16-mm lens. It’s a 1-minute exposure at f/2.8 with an ISO setting of 800.
Courtesy Alan Dyer.
The night sky offers many wonderful sights, but few are as magical as meteors. These “shooting stars” are fleeting, unpredictable, and incredibly beautiful. Every time I see one, I feel as though I’ve received a special gift from the cosmos.

Meteors happen all the time. You’re almost sure to see them any time you spend a few hours looking at a clear, dark sky. But you can improve your odds tremendously by going out during one of the annual meteor showers — bursts of meteors that take place on roughly the same dates every year.

The strongest and most reliable meteor showers are the Perseids of August and December’s Geminids. Balmy weather and summer vacations have made the Perseids well known and popular, but the Geminids are actually easier to view from mid-northern latitudes. For one thing, nights are much longer in December. And while the Perseids are best viewed before dawn (as most showers are), the Geminids offer excellent viewing starting in mid- to late evening.

This year, the best time to view the Geminids from North America is the night of December 13–14, with good prospects the following night as well. In Asia, December 14–15 should be better, and in Europe, it’s a tossup between the two.

Your Detailed Local Forecast

This photo shows Geminids streaming away from the shower's radiant near the star Castor. It was made by combining 83 out of 1,256 exposures shot over an 11-hour time span on December 13-14, 2004. Click above for a larger image.
Fred Bruenjes
All the meteors in a shower appear to stream at us from a single spot in the sky: the shower’s radiant. Meteor showers are named after their radiants. For instance, the Geminids stream away from a point in the northeastern corner of the constellation Gemini, which is currently host to brilliant Mars.

All other things being equal, the higher a shower’s radiant is in the sky, the more meteors you’ll see. The Geminid’s radiant is highest around 2 a.m., and it’s already well above the eastern horizon by 9 or 10 p.m. for observers at mid-northern latitudes. That means that the Geminids usually offer excellent shows in the late evening. But there are two more factors to consider.

The darker the sky is, the more meteors you’ll see — and the more spectacular they’ll appear. So it’s usually best to pick a time when the Moon isn’t up. Fortunately, the Moon is a thin waxing crescent during this year’s Geminids, setting before the shower is in full swing and not very bright even while it’s still up.

The final factor is the shower’s inherent strength: the number of meteoroids hitting Earth as a whole, regardless of your own local circumstances. Some showers stretch over many days or even weeks, but the Geminids have a very sharp peak. The curve is also strikingly asymmetric. It takes two days for the rate to climb from one-fifth of the maximum to full strength, but less than one day to drop back to the same level.

This year the Geminids’ peak arrives at 17h Universal Time on Friday, December 14th. That’s great news in East Asia, where the peak coincides with the radiant’s reaching its highest point in the sky, during the early hours of Saturday morning. But in the Americas, the peak falls right in the middle of the day, at noon Eastern Standard Time on Friday. So we’ll miss the very best part of the show.

Because the Geminid rate rises slower than it falls, prospects for North Americans are better before the peak than afterward. Activity should start out modestly around 9 or 10 p.m. on Thursday, December 13th, and then strengthen steadily throughout the night. Just before dawn on Friday morning, you might see a meteor every minute or two from a dark location.

On Friday evening, activity should start about as well as it did on Thursday evening but then decline steadily throughout the night. In fact, the predawn hours of Thursday may offer better viewing, even though they’re more than a day before the shower’s peak.

If you'd like to try not just sightseeing but doing a genuine meteor count, one worth reporting to the International Meteor Organization, see our article "Advanced Meteor Observing". It's easier than it sounds.

The real horrors of Fibromyalgia

2007-12-08T19:53:00.000-08:00

Fibromyalgia – Its Many Possible Symptoms, Diagnosis via Palpation
of the Musculoskeletal Tissues (Mapping), and the Guaifenesin
Protocol
by R. Paul St. Amand, MD and Claudia Craig Marek, MA

12-01-2007 Fibromyalgia is a symptomatically progressive illness
that affects millions of people. It is manifested by many complaints
that early in the disease come and go, but later are unrelenting.
Recurrent flares eventually involve multiple body areas and systems
until patients simply cycle from bad to worse.

They are typically referred from doctor to doctor based on
individual complaints. The specialist may fail to grasp the extent
of the problem and divide the disease into categories that lead to
medical dead ends or incomplete treatments. Some of these symptom
clusters are:

Chronic fatigue,
Systemic candidiasis,
Myofascial pain,
Irritable bowel, or
Vulvar pain syndrome.

There are no diagnostic x-ray or laboratory tests to diagnose
Fibromyalgia.

The American College of Rheumatology recommends eliciting pain from
at least 11 out of 18 predetermined "tender points" to confirm the
diagnosis after a medical history is taken. Unfortunately,
individual pain perception and tenderness vary greatly. Chronic
fatigue patients have high pain thresholds and are not particularly
sensitive to finger-poking. They may feel stiff, but complain mainly
of exhaustion, muscle stiffness and cognitive impairment. The
confirmation of affected tissue is more reliably obtained by using
our method of palpation that we call mapping.

The original description of fibromyalgia as "rheumatism with hard
and tender places" has been forgotten. The tender-point exam seeks
subjective patient pain sensations and so lacks the accuracy of
objective, sequential body examinations (mapping).

We examine the musculoskeletal tissues using the pads of our fingers
to feel muscles, tendons, and ligaments.

With practice, multiple swollen places become obvious. We sketch
their location, size and degree of hardness on a caricature that
becomes our baseline for future comparisons. Hands should move as if
to iron out wrinkles in the underlying tissues. Expressions of
tenderness do not influence findings. The most important site for
confirming the diagnosis and establishing the efficacy of treatment
is the left thigh. The outside of the quadriceps muscle (Vastus
lateralis) and the front part (Rectus femoris) are involved in 100%
of adults; they clear within the first month of proper treatment.

Fibromyalgia has no set symptoms.

Various combinations from the following list can be anticipated.
(But importantly: Do not assume fibromyalgia is the cause of all
symptoms. When in doubt or confronted with new problems, please
consult your personal physician or appropriate specialist.)

Central Nervous System: Fatigue, irritability, nervousness,
depression, apathy, listlessness, impaired memory and concentration,
anxieties and even suicidal thoughts. Insomnia and frequent
awakening due to pain result in non restorative sleep.

Musculoskeletal: Swollen structures press on nerves to produce all
types of pains including stiffness. Any muscle, tendon, ligament or
fascia in the face, neck, shoulders, back, hips, knees, ankles,
feet, arms, legs and chest may be involved. Calf/foot cramps,
numbness and tingling of the face or extremities is common. Old
injured or operative sites are commonly affected. Fibromyalgia is
erroneously considered non-arthritic even though joint pain,
swelling, heat and redness occur in a large percentage of patients.

Irritable Bowel: Symptoms include nausea (usually transient,
repetitive waves), indigestion, gas, bloating, deep pain, cramps,
alternating constipation and diarrhea sometimes with mucous stools.

Genitourinary: Mostly affecting women are pungent urine, frequent
urination, bladder spasms, burning urination (dysuria) with or
without repeated bladder infections and interstitial cystitis.
Vulvodynia (vulvar pain syndrome) includes vaginal spasm, irritation
of the labia (vulvitis) or deeper (vestibulitis) that induce painful
intercourse (dyspareunia) all without the typical cottage-cheese
discharge that accompanies yeast infections. Fibromyalgia is worse
premenstrually.

Dermatological: Various rashes may appear with or without itching:
Hives, red blotches, itchy bumps or blisters, eczema, seborrheic or
neurodermatitis, and rosacea. Skin is dry and nails are brittle or
easily peel; hair is of poor quality and often falls out
prematurely. Strange sensations (paresthesias) are common such as
cold, burning (especially palms, soles and thighs), crawling,
electric vibrations, prickling, super-sensitivity to touch, and
flushing often with sweating.

Head, Eye, Ear, Nose, and Throat: Headaches (migraines), dizziness,
vertigo (spinning) or imbalance; itchy, burning and dry eyes or lids
sometimes produce morning sticky or sandy discharges; blurred
vision; hay fever or nasal congestion and post-nasal drip; painful,
burning or cut-tongue sensation, scalded mouth and abnormal tastes
(bad, metallic); intermittent low-pitched sounds or transient
ringing in the ears (tinnitus); ear and eyeball pain; sensitivity to
light, sounds and odors (perfumes or chemicals).

Miscellaneous Symptoms: Weight gain; mild fever; reduced immunity to
infection; fluid retention with morning eyelid and hand swelling
that gravitates to the legs by evening, stretches tiny tissue nerves
to produce restless leg syndrome; adult-onset asthma.

Hypoglycemia Syndrome: This is a separate entity that may affect
thirty percent of female and fifteen percent of male fibromyalgics.
Sugar craving, tremors, clamminess, anxiety, panic attacks, heart
pounding, headaches and faintness induced by hunger or by eating
sugar and starches (carbohydrates) are solid clues for diagnosis.

R. Paul St. Amand, MD
Associate Clinical Professor Medicine
Endocrinology - Harbor-UCLA

Gates vs. GM - this is so funny!!!

2007-12-08T19:42:00.001-08:00

My favorite is #5, yes I am very anti-Mac, for many different reasons. But that's for another day. Enjoy!

Gates vs. GM

For all of us who feel only the deepest love and affection for the way computers have enhanced our lives, read on.

At a recent computer expo (COMDEX), Bill Gates reportedly compared the computer industry with the auto industry and stated,

"If GM had kept up with technology like the computer industry has, we would all be driving $25.00 cars that got 1,000 miles to the gallon."

In response to Bill's comments, General Motors issued a press release stating:

If GM had developed technology like Microsoft, we would all be driving cars with the following characteristics (and I just love this part):

1. For no reason whatsoever, your car would crash........Twice a day.

2. Every time they repainted the lines in the road, you would have to buy a new car.

3. Occasionally your car would die on the freeway for no reason. You would have to pull to the side of the road, close all of the windows, shut off the car, restart it, and reopen the windows before you could continue. For some reason you would simply accept this.

4. Occasionally, executing a maneuver such as a left turn would cause your car to shut down and refuse to restart, in which case you would have to reinstall the engine.

5. Macintosh would make a car that was powered by the sun, was reliable, five times as fast and twice as easy to drive - but would run on only five percent of the roads.

6. The oil, water temperature, and alternator warning lights would all be replaced by a single "This Car Has Performed An Illegal Operation" warning light.

7. The airbag system would ask "Are you sure?" before deploying.

8. Occasionally, for no reason whatsoever, your car would lock you out and refuse to let you in until you simultaneously lifted the door handle, turned the key and grabbed hold of the radio antenna.

9. Every time a new car was introduced car buyers would have to learn how to drive all over again because none of the controls would operate in the same manner as the old car.

10. You'd have to press the "Start" button to turn the engine off.

Why you should not drive while talking and holding a cell phone!

2007-12-07T19:48:00.000-08:00

I'm sending this because I want people to be as safe as possible while driving on the road, whether you are in a city, town or on the freeway. I realize that those of you who are safe drivers, already know about the law that states that if you turn your windshield whippers on during rain, mist, fog and/or snow, that you must turn on your headlights. Well, during the last rain storm, I noticed that at least half the people I saw on the road did not have their headlights on, and even when I flicked my lights at them, they had no clue as to why I was doing that. On the freeways, the numbers of people without their lights on was more like 75%, which just scares me to death.

I just do not understand what these people don't get about needing to turn on their lights so that other people can see them and also because it's a state law in California, as well as in 28 other states. You shouldn't even have to be told that it is a law - it should be automatic. But sadly this is not the case :( So because of this and until law enforcement understands that they need to start cracking down on this and ticketing people for it during storms, I think it would help if we all try to spread the word to our own friends and family and have them do the same in return. I think that if people really made the effort to do this, we would have less accidents. I realize that people also need to slow down, instead of seeming to drive even faster when it rains than they do when it is not - (someone please explain this to me because the logic of it makes no sense) - and that the two combined would probably prevent a majority of the number of accidents we see and the traffic created by those accidents.

So please spread the word, and help educate those who are not aware. I believe that education will greatly help to make drivers drive safer in those types of conditions. If no one ever tells them about a new law (and this one was passed in 2005), then they will never obey it. Here is some more info on this particular law:

Headlamps on Motor Vehicles

24400. (a) A motor vehicle, other than a motorcycle, shall be:

(1) ( )1 Equipped with at least two ( )2 headlamps, with at least one on each side of the front of the vehicle, and, except as to vehicles registered prior to January 1, 1930, they shall be located directly above or in advance of the front axle of the vehicle. The headlamps and every light source in any headlamp unit shall be located at a height of not more than 54 inches nor less than 22 inches.

(2) Operated during darkness, or inclement weather, or both, with at least two lighted headlamps that comply with paragraph (1).

(b) As used in paragraph (2) of subdivision (a), “inclement weather” is a weather condition that is either of the following:

(1) A condition that prevents a driver of a motor vehicle from clearly discerning a person or another motor vehicle on the highway from a distance of 1,000 feet.

(2) A condition requiring the windshield wipers to be in continuous use due to rain, mist, snow, fog, or other precipitation or atmospheric moisture.( )3

Added Sec. 2, Ch. 415, Stats. 2004. Effectve January 1, 2005. Operative July 1, 2005.
Amended Sec. 9, Ch. 311, Stats. 2006. Effective January 1, 2007.
The 2006 amendment added the italicized material, and at the point(s) indicated, deleted the following:

1. “During darkness and inclement weather, a motor vehicle, other than a motorcycle, shall be equipped”
2. “lighted”
3. “(c) This section shall become operative on July 1, 2005.

And for those who are not aware of this either, now is the time to stop using your cell phones in your vehicles OR get a hands-free headset, because come Jan 1, 2008, a new law will come into effect banning the use of cell phones by the driver of a vehicle - meaning you cannot be holding your phone with one hand and talking while driving your vehicle. I believe this is one of the top reasons that accidents happen all too often these days. Most of the time, when I am driving around, it is the people who are weaving, driving right on the line seperating two lanes on streets or freeways plus not even paying attention to what they are doing, let alone looking straight in front of them and even driving eratically while multi-tasking with their phone in their car, who are responsible for accidents and traffic.

I no longer answer my phone while in my car and people just need to accept that. When I drive long distances, like up to Oregon, I especially don't answer it. If I need to make a call or return one, I will do so at a rest stop or I will pull over. I don't care how someone wants to justify it, it is just not safe! So go buy your hands-free headsets and you'll be just fine. I have one on my Christmas list :)

Instructors who teach driving classes will tell you the same thing - even with the use of headsets for phones, there are still certain conditions where it is not safe to be doing something else while driving such as having a conversation with someone - in the car or on your phone! See what happens the next time you are driving your vehicle and you're having a conversation with someone who is also in your vehicle. What happens when you suddenly have to hit the brakes to prevent crashing into someone who has stopped quickly in front of you or because there is suddenly a build up of stopped traffic? I bet you anything, that you are going to stop talking for that temporary moment while you slow down your vehicle and assess what is going on in front of you.

Please help spread the word, to help make our roads safer to drive on. Thank you!

Comet Holmes information

2007-11-17T20:01:00.000-08:00

This is a really great link that gives a detailed timemap of it's journey through out sky along with amazing pictures. I was finally able to see if the other night. Just amazing! I remember my dad waking me up at 4am in lake tahoe when I was a little girl, to walk down in the freezing cold air to the pier and look at Haley's Comet.

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/community/skyblog/observingblog/10775326.html

Leonids 2007

2007-11-17T19:57:00.001-08:00

Leonids 2007
The Leonid meteor shower has been responsible for some of the most spectacular celestial displays in history. Most recently, there were several extremely intense Leonids from 1998 to 2002, with some observers reporting more than 1,000 meteors per hour.

Meteor storms like these happen only around the time that the parent comet, 55P/Tempel-Tuttle, makes it closest approach to the Sun. Tempel-Tuttle is now far from Earth and the Sun, so the 2007 Leonids are expected to be modest, with no more then 10 meteors visible per hour. However, the Leonids have yielded surprises before, so they're always worth watching.

The shower peaks on the night of Saturday–Sunday, November 17–18. Leonids start to be visible after the shower's radiant rises above the horizon, around midnight at mid-northern latitudes. Conveniently, the Moon sets around the same time. You're likely to see increasing numbers of meteors as the radiant gets higher toward dawn.

As long as you're outside in the early morning, don't forget to look at the sky's other attractions. In addition to all the brilliant winter stars, several bright planets are on display. Mars blazes at magnitude -1 almost directly overhead. Saturn climbs into the sky not far behind the Leonids' radiant. And Venus clears the eastern horizon around 3 a.m.

And of course, take a good look at amazing Comet Holmes, which is well above the horizon all night long.

Terry Factor - An absolutely amazing Ventriloquist!

2007-11-17T19:44:00.000-08:00

Watch these videos to check him out! Wow, I'm just stunned!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZMi5IQNY84

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTSFhIv9bYg&feature=related - Kermit the Frog

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnVDHzUAj30&feature=related - Unforgettable

Gold Country Lost Caves Discovered!

2007-11-17T19:42:00.001-08:00

Lost caves revealed

Published: November 16, 2007

Click this picture to view a larger image.

Amy Alonzo/Union Democrat

By JAMES DAMSCHRODER

The Union Democrat

When New Melones Dam was filled a quarter century ago this year, thousands of acres of history and prehistory were lost to its watery depths.

Drought conditions, however, have lowered the lake level by 93 feet, bringing back a glimpse of what was lost – notably, several of the 20-plus caves inundated when the dam's floodwaters began to rise.

Ralph Squire, 78, vice president of the Columbia Grotto of the National Speleological Society, said there are two significant caves that became visible when the water level dropped.

Both are located near the east end of the reservoir where the Main and South forks of the Stanislaus River converge. Several smaller grottoes also exist.

One of the significant caves is Coral Cave.

"When the Native Americans lived there, they quarried travertine for religious jewelry," Squire said. "Some of that jewelry has been found on the North Coast because they used to trade it."

Squire wasn't able to save this cave from drowning, but he was able to save others.

While serving as the chairman of the New Melones Task Force almost 30 years ago, he made recommendations to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to purchase 1,500 acres of land in the area to preserve some of the more significant caves threatened by the reservoir.

Still, 20 to 30 caves lay beneath the murky waters of the New Melones Lake, he said.

Where the Main and South forks of the Stanislaus meet, the landscape changes — the valley narrows and

the clay banks that surround the lake's western edges are replaced by jutting limestone cliffs.

The limestone is responsible for the area's caverns, said John Gardner, 60, of Columbia, a member of the Columbia Grotto.

Millions of years ago, hot brine pools formed, dissolving much of the limestone, and left these enormous caverns.

"I like the formations," said Gardner, who started caving when he was 16. "All the beauty the caves have to offer. I've been doing it a long time."

The caves attract people of all ages, like Michael White Jr., 15, a member of the Columbia Grotto, who first starting exploring caves with his father at age 6.

"You get to see a lot of things that other people don't," White said. "When I'm down there, it's relieving. There is no one around. It's quiet."

To explore Coral Cave now, you have to get in the bone-chilling water to fit through the cave entrance, which is now peaking out only a few feet above the waterline.

Once inside the cave, it opens up. Stalactites drip from the ceiling and stalagmites boil from the floor.

Experts warn that cave exploring is not for novices.

Lisa Boulton, marketing director for Sierra Nevada Recreation — the company that runs the tours for the area's Moaning and California caverns — said it's not a good idea for the inexperienced to explore wild caves.

"Don't go without someone that's an experienced caver," Boulton said. "It can be extremely dangerous."

Another reason novices are urged to go with more experienced spelunkers: Caves are fragile.

Grotto member Mike White Sr., 37, said that when someone abuses rock or mineral formations in a cave, it can take thousands of years for the damage to be undone.

"People should treat them (wild caves) as a treasure," White Sr. said. "Stalactites don't look as good on your coffee table as they would in the cave."

Particularly caves one rarely gets to visit.

"It's special because of the limited time you get to see it," White said of Coral Cave. "It's neat because it was proven that American Indians used it as a shelter."

Explore a real cave!! Neato :)

2007-11-12T22:35:00.000-08:00

This is so cool!! Click on the link and then click on a red spot on the map of the cave. A new window will open and you'll see a 360 degree view of the part of the cave that you are in. With your cursor, click on that new screen and you can move around the cave, go down the tunnels, etc. This is a fantastic project!!

http://www.burger.si/Jame/KriznaJama/NovaKriznaJama/ENG_Uvod_NovaKriznaJama.html

:)

New study - Teens who use cannabis!!

2007-11-12T19:33:00.000-08:00

I think it is awesome that someone is doing studies like this one!

Teens that use cannabis may function better than teen tobacco-users, and appear to be more socially driven and have fewer psychosocial problems than those who do not use either substance, according to a Swiss survey.

Researchers at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland surveyed 5,263 students, including 455 who smoke marijuana only, 1,703 who smoke marijuana and tobacco and 3,105 who smoked neither one.

The survey, which will be published in the November issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, found that marijuana-only smokers had better relationships with friends, better grades and were more likely to play sports than teens who smoked tobacco and those who abstained from both substances.

A U.S. substance abuse expert disagreed with the study and said U.S. teens should not be encouraged to use marijuana, particularly since teenagers’ brains are still developing at this time.

“Switzerland is very liberal compared to us in many ways,” Dr. Edwin Salsitz, senior physician of chemical dependency at Beth Israel Medical Center. “In general, it’s not a good idea for teenagers to use psychoactive drugs. The brain is still developing until the age of 21.

“Maybe (there’s) a cultural bias there that says it’s ok to use marijuana once or twice a month,” he continued “But from what I know, I’ve never heard that anyone thought it was beneficial. Most experts here would say that it’s not a good idea to use cannabis before the age of 15, because it interferes with school and the development of brain.”

Researchers found that marijuana-only users had the following characteristics:

— More likely to be male (71.6 percent marijuana smokers versus 59.7 percent of teens who used tobacco and marijuana)

— Play sports (85.5 percent vs. 66.7 percent of tobacco and marijuana)

— Live with both parents (78.2 percent vs. 68.3 percent of tobacco and marijuana)

— Have good grades (77.5 percent vs. 66.6 percent of tobacco and marijuana)

Cannabis-only smokers were also less likely to have been drunk in the past 30 days, less likely to use cannabis before the age of 15 and less likely to use marijuana more than once or twice in the past 30 days. They were also less likely to use other illegal drugs, compared to students who used both substances, researchers found.

“The gateway theory hypothesizes that the use of legal drugs (tobacco and alcohol) is the previous step to cannabis consumption,” the authors wrote. “However, recent research also indicates that cannabis use may precede or be simultaneous to tobacco use and that, in fact, its use may reinforce cigarette smoking or lead to nicotine addiction independently of smoking status. In any case, and even though they do not seem to have great personal, family, or academic problems, the situation of those adolescents who use cannabis but who declare not using tobacco should not be trivialized.”

In comparison to students who abstained from both substances, marijuana-only smokers were:

— More likely to be male (71.6 percent cannabis users vs. 47.7 percent of teens who abstained)

— Have a good relationship with friends (87 percent vs. 83.2 percent)

— Be sensation-seeking (37.8 percent vs. 21.8 percent)

— Play sports (85.5 percent vs. 76.6 percent)

— Less likely to have a good relationship with their parents (74.1 percent vs. 82.4 percent)

The fact that some students who smoked marijuana were less likely to have a good relationship with their parents wasn’t surprising to Salsitz. “The way to look at it is to look at alcohol as an analogy,” he said. “Do adults or teens who use alcohol have better relationships than those abstinent? That’s just not true. It looks like if you smoke marijuana and not tobacco, it’s better for you.”

He said the study should be viewed in terms of culture. “In France, people drink wine with food, but they don’t get drunk,” he said. “Kids also start doing this when they are young, and that’s different from here. I don’t think anyone would say that the active ingredient in marijuana is doing anything good in the brain, compared to abstaining or smoking tobacco, so there must be cultural reason for this happening.”

Live painter on stage

2007-11-12T18:38:00.001-08:00

This guy is pretty cool: http://www.youtube.com/swf/l.swf?video_id=QZFkZiwMLZ4&eurl=&iurl=http%3A//img.youtube.com/vi/QZFkZiwMLZ4/default.jpg&t=OEgsToPDskJYd0whWtTTSf7dOhlgctTV&rel=1&border=0

Enjoy!

New comet in the sky and many events associated...

2007-11-11T00:51:00.000-08:00

Space Weather News for Nov. 9, 2007
http://spaceweather.com

COMET TAIL: Exploding Comet 17P/Holmes continues to amaze onlookers. On Nov. 8th and 9th part of the comet's blue tail broke away in view of many backyard telescopes. Visit http://spaceweather.com to see photos of the "disconnection event" and speculation about what might have caused it.

TAURID METEOR SHOWER: The annual Northern Taurid meteor shower caused by Comet Encke peaks on Nov. 12th. Although Taurid rates are normally low, only about five meteors per hour, those five can be doozies. The shower is a well-known producer of slow, bright fireballs visible at all hours of the night. If you're outside after dark this weekend, be alert for Taurids.

Would you like to subscribe to Spaceweather Alerts? Click here: http://spaceweather.com/services/

Fleet Week from afar

2007-11-10T22:55:00.000-08:00

I love Fleet Week every year. I remember very clearly growing up in Alameda, right smack next to the Naval Base here when it was up and running. I miss that. I wish we still had some kind of a miliary prescense here. My dad was in the Navy as a Naval Dentist, pretty cool! Anyway, many times a month we'd have these amazingly awesome jet aircraft flying over our house from takeoff or before landing at the Alameda naval base. I love the booming sound of Mach 1 and the prescision at which they can fly, so fast and such amazing acceleration. Fleet Week is all about celebrating that for the Bay Area. There are awesome naval boats that come into the bay and dock and you can actually tour the boats themselves. I believe this year and a few years ago there was a submarine included in the on water fleet. The Blue Angels fortunately were able to perform this year - some stupid anti-war people protested their prescense and tried to get them kicked out of the show. I realize what they fly is a war plane but also realize that I used to live here when they flew here all the time and I felt pretty darn safe. I am very anti-war but I love airplanes, especially jets so I'm not going to be against them flying. I think realistically they stand for more than just war but for freedom for our country and living free as Americans do. They also stand for peace. The Blue Angels recently lost one of their own when a stunt went wrong and they celebrated this pilot's legacy by having a new pilot come on board. I think what they do is really cool and just amazing. So I got some great pics from far away - when I was walking Goldie out in Harbor Bay, at the point and there was some other people out there purposely to watch the show. Over that weekend, I went out onto the Alameda Base and drove out on one of the many runways to where a bunch of parked cars were and people were up on their cars, looking over the fence and through it to get a great view of the planes flying and doing their stunts. I went over to the city with my dad last year for the first time but decided against it this year as I was not feeling well enough to deal with that many people - almost as bad as during Kaboom - on public transportation, so we stayed home. On Sunday my dad and I went out to the Berkeley marina, parked and walked out on the pier to watch them fly and I'm glad we did, because they occasionally did loop backs, where they fly across the bay to the Berkeley/Oakland area, turn around and fly back to set up for a new stunt. So my pics came out surprisingly well and I don't know if you'll be able to see the planes in the picture clearly or not but maybe you can get it to resize. :)

Tahoe in September

2007-11-10T22:42:00.000-08:00

So at the same Tahoe trip as below, my brother was here with us, which was just awesome, as we don't see him in person that often. We really wanted to go in and see Euer Valley before it got closed for winter. So off we went on Monday after the wedding fun weekend. It was so beautiful, hardly any people in there besides the caretaker and it was still very green too. But the lake was really low, as well as the stream, which can be sad to see but I know that is part of life too. J and I went up to the lake on the motorcycle, me riding on the back. It's great that the two of us can ride one bike, me holding on for dear life - almost got bounced off coming back down the hill! I took some amazing pictures, practicing taking pictures of the reflections in the water and on the water's surface - of trees and these beautiful clouds that rolled in while we were up there. So enjoy these pictures too!

Pictures from Dog Art Festival in Lake Tahoe

2007-11-10T18:19:00.000-08:00

These are from the dog art festival I went to day after the wedding, which is noted for Sept 2007 - it was just awesome! I got some really incredible pictures, which I will list below. So many dogs, the most I've ever seen in one place, even more different varieties of breeds then you would see in a dog park! And most were friendly and loved the attention, so it was a free for all in terms of getting lots of doggy love. I got some great information and was able to donate a few extra bucks towards the organizations that I learned about AND learned about some vets in the area, and other holistic pet shops and such that I'll have to check out next time I'm up in Tahoe and now I know that if I ever had an emergency situation with my kitty, because I do take him up to Tahoe when I go, that I will know where to take him. Knock on wood that that never happens but I like to be prepared!

So below are the pictures I was just talking about. These dogs were amazing. There was a fly ball contest, where the owners launched a tennis ball and the dogs would run and leap off the dock and the contest was to see how far the dog would jump and then land in the water. The pics of those came out amazingly great! The winner landed 21 feet out! Wow! I missed that one, which was right in the beginning but my brother saw it and said it was pretty neat.

We also at the end of the festival, before we left, got to watch a rescue dog demo, put on by the Alpine dog team that works out of the whole Tahoe and Donner areas, in search and rescue all year round. But they are the ones you'll see with dogs on snow mobiles and out running next to their partners who are on skiis. So they eldest rescue dog, the greyish cattle dog that is in my picture, is a female and has been working as a rescue dog since she was a puppy. She is now 15 and still does it. It's based on a reward/game system. The dogs really enjoy finding a person or object and they know that once they go to work, the faster that they find what they are looking for, the quicker they'll get to play afterwards with their favorite toy. Many of the dogs like the game of tug, so that is their reward. I was told that in the united states we use the toy reward and in Canada, they use a treat system. So everyone is different and different techniques work well for many reasons. But it was so fun watching this dog get into 'work' mode and run off and watch as the trainer gave her commands and how intelligent she really was. We all knew where the person was hiding but it was neat to see how accurate she was and what signals she gives her handler when she knows that she's in proximity to the person needing to be saved. They work a lot with avalanche victims and other situations like that. Enjoy the pictures!

Living With Invisible Chronic Pain!

2007-11-07T00:58:00.001-08:00

Living With Pain That Just Won’t Go Away

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By JANE E. BRODY
Published: November 6, 2007

Pain, especially pain that doesn’t quit, changes a person. And rarely for the better. The initial reaction to serious pain is usually fear (what is wrong with me, and is it curable?), but pain that fails to respond to treatment leads to anxiety, depression, anger and irritability.
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Stuart Bradford

At age 29, Walter, a computer programmer in Silicon Valley, developed a repetitive stress injury that caused severe pain in his hands when he touched the keyboard. The injury did not respond to rest. The pain became worse, spreading to his shoulders, neck and back.

Unable to work, lift, carry or squeeze anything without enduring days of crippling pain, Walter could no longer drive, open a jar or even sign his name.

“At age 29, I was on Social Security disability, basically confined to home, and my life seemed to be over,” Walter recalls in “Living With Chronic Pain,” by Dr. Jennifer Schneider. Severely depressed, he wonders whether his life is worth living.

Yet, despite his limited mobility and the pain-induced frown lines in his face, to look at Walter is to see a strapping, healthy young man. It is hard to tell that he, or any other person beset with chronic pain, is suffering as much as he says he is.

Pain is an invisible, subjective symptom. The body of a chronic pain sufferer — someone with fibromyalgia, for example, or back pain — usually appears intact. There are no objective tests to detect pain or measure its intensity. You just have to take a person’s word for it.

Nearly 10 percent of people in the United States suffer from moderate to severe chronic pain, and the prevalence increases with age. Complete relief from chronic pain is rare even with the best treatment, which is itself a rarity. Doctors and patients alike, who misunderstand the effects of narcotics, are too often reluctant to use drugs like opioids, which can relieve acute, as well as chronic, pain and may head off the development of a chronic pain syndrome.

Why Pain Persists

The problems with chronic pain are that it never really ends and does not always respond to treatment. If the pain initially was caused by an injury or illness, it can persist long after the injury has healed or the illness defeated because permanent changes have occurred in the body.

Mark Grant, a psychologist in Australia who specializes in managing chronic pain, says the notion that “physical injury equals pain” is overly simplistic. “We now know that pain is caused and maintained by a combination of physical, psychological and neurological factors,” Mr. Grant writes on his Web site, www.overcomingpain.com. With chronic pain, a persistent physical cause often cannot be determined.

“Chronic pain can be caused by muscle tension, changes in circulation, postural imbalances, psychological distress and neurological changes,” Mr. Grant says on his site. “It is also known that unrelieved pain is associated with increased metabolic rate, spontaneous excitation of the central nervous system, changes in blood circulation to the brain and changes in the limbic-hypothalamic system,” the region of the brain that regulates emotions.

Dr. Schneider, the author of “Living With Chronic Pain” (Healthy Living Books, Hatherleigh Press, 2004), is a specialist in pain management in Tucson, Ariz. In her book, she points out that the nervous system is responsible for the two major types of chronic pain.

One, called nociceptive pain, “arises from injury to muscles, tendons and ligaments or in the internal organs,” she writes. Undamaged nerve cells responding to an injury outside themselves transmit pain signals to the spinal cord and then to the brain. The resulting pain is usually described as deep and throbbing. Examples include chronic low back pain, osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, fibromyalgia, headaches, interstitial cystitis and chronic pelvic pain.

The second type, neuropathic pain, “results from abnormal nerve function or direct damage to a nerve.” Among the causes are shingles, diabetic neuropathy, reflex sympathetic dystrophy, phantom limb pain, radiculopathy, spinal stenosis, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease, stroke and spinal cord injury.

The damaged nerve fibers “can fire spontaneously, both at the site of the injury and at other places along the nerve pathway” and “can continue indefinitely even after the source of the injury has stopped sending pain messages,” Dr. Schneider writes.

“Neuropathic pain can be constant or intermittent, burning, aching, shooting or stabbing, and it sometimes radiates down the arms or legs,” she adds. This kind of pain tends “to involve exaggerated responses to painful stimuli, spread of pain to areas that were not initially painful, and sensations of pain in response to normally nonpainful stimuli such as light touch.” It is often worse at night and may involve abnormal sensations like tingling, pins and needles, and intense itching.

Some chronic pain syndromes involve both nociceptive and neuropathic pain. A common example is sciatica; a pinched nerve causes back pain that radiates down the leg. In some cases, the pain of sciatica is not felt in the back but only in the leg, making the cause difficult to diagnose without an M.R.I.

Beyond Physical Problems

The consequences of chronic pain typically extend well beyond the discomfort from the sensation of pain itself. Dr. Schneider lists these potential physical effects: poor wound healing, weakness and muscle breakdown, decreased movement that can lead to blood clots, shallow breathing and suppressed coughing that raise the risk of pneumonia, sodium and water retention in the kidneys, raised heart rate and blood pressure, weakened immune system, a slowing of gastrointestinal motility, difficulty sleeping, loss of appetite and weight, and fatigue.

But that is hardly the end of it. The psychological and social consequences of chronic pain can be enormous. Unremitting pain can rob a person of the ability to enjoy life, maintain important relationships, fulfill spousal and parental responsibilities, perform well at a job or work at all.

The economic burdens can be severe, especially when the patient is the primary breadwinner or holds a job that provides the family’s health insurance. Only about half of patients with chronic pain “who undergo comprehensive multidisciplinary pain rehabilitation are able to return to work,” Dr. Schneider reports.

As for the notion that chronic pain patients are often malingering — seeking attention and escape from responsibilities — pain specialists say that is nonsense. No one in his right mind — and most patients were in their right minds before the pain began — would trade a fulfilling life for the misery of chronic pain.

Other bad drivers

2007-11-06T20:38:00.000-08:00

I really don't get it about California. Why does everyone have to be in such a damn hurry to get to where they are going? Do you know that when you drive like a maniac that you cause accidents and sometimes cause lives? All of these innocent people out on the roads, driving by the law and then someone comes weaving down the hwy, and bam, crashed into someone. I had a nightmare last night that I was on Hwy 80 and some jerk slammed into my car, pushing me into a pileup of cars, then pinning me in the car and I couldn't move. I woke up before finding out the rest - needless to say, I didnt' sleep so well after that :(

If you're not aware, when you leave the state of California and go into another state, driving is so much more relaxing and peaceful. This is true! I can prove it to you! Drive north on I-5 and cross the border into Oregon. Yes, you're still up in the mountains so driving is still risky but once you get down into Ashland, people are obeying the speed limit - what a concept!!! - and no one tail gates or flips you off when something is their fault. There are no mad drivers weaving in and out of traffic like maniacs. There are less crashes, more related to the weather and not bad drivers. I always look forward to driving up to Oregon for this very reason. The drive on the way back, however, is garenteed to put a frown on my face :( It's always a nightmare. One thing I can't stand in Calif., is these stupid drivers, usually older ladies, who cannot and refuse! to drive around a truck. And this is usually on the highway, where you have two lanes in each direction and they are in the fast lane and just sitting directly behind or right next to a truck, going the same speed as the truck, so below the speed limit. You can honk and scream and yell all that you want to but it does no good. These types of drivers should not be on the road! I would yank their licenses so fast if I were a cop or a judge. I really think someone should bring the idea of "Citizens Arrest" into the works.

For example, tonight on my way home. I stop at the stop sign, make a FULL stop because it's the law! and on the side of the incoming traffic is a car that just kinda rolls through the stop sign and then sorta stops out halfway in the middle of the intersection. I'm sitting in my car, with a frown and discusted look on my face - i then realized it was a cop! WTF??!! You have to follow the rules too buddy. Unless you're in an emergency and have your ligths on, you can't just roll through a stop sign. So if I could pull a citizens arrest, I would take pictures of the event happening, document the location, time and date and then bring the paperwork into my local police station. I think there should be something that allows us good, safe drivers to do this! Thats just my way of doing some wishful thinking.

And there should also be a way to report wrreckless drivers. YOu can report drunk drivers by calling 911. One time when I was driving home from Oregon, on I-5, a truck was speeding - and I mean going over 80, because I only wanted to get ahead of this bastard, so I had to go almost 90 mph just to get around him. Then he passed me again, almost side swiping me in the process and then almost tapping the front bumper of my car. I swear that time slowed down in that instant and I thought, I don't want to die this way! I thought what can I do about this: So I dialed the highway patrol number that I have in my cell and got a message saying for me to hold. I stayed on the phone (which I hate doing when I'm driving and I cannot wait for January when the new law about not driving with a cell phone in use comes into play) and I couldn't sit on hold forever so I hung up. What I ended up doing and I recommend you doing this if you are ever in a similiar situation, is to get all of the numbers off of the truck - and learn to write without looking at what you're writing - get the numbers off the cab most importantly but I know it's almost impossible to read the license attached to the cab, so get the one on the trailer. Also note the date, time, and where you are on a freeway or hwy. Get the name of the truck company and any other info that you can get. When I got home, I googled the truck company and on the website, got the email for phone for the CEO or manager or owner and filed a complaint. I had to do this with two different truck companies from that one trip and one of the companies, the guy I dealt with was very apologetic and said that the driver would be reprimanded right away. I dont know what actually happened to the driver but I at least felt relieved that someone was notified.

Brain-eating amoeba discovered in Lake Havasu

2007-09-29T20:16:00.000-07:00

This is fucking scary! And I've been in Lake Havasue so many times!! Just glad its been a while!!

6 Die From Brain-Eating Amoeba in Lakes

By CHRIS KAHN, Associated Press Writer

Friday, September 28, 2007
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(09-28) 21:59 PDT PHOENIX, (AP) --

It sounds like science fiction but it's true: A killer amoeba living in lakes enters the body through the nose and attacks the brain where it feeds until you die.

Even though encounters with the microscopic bug are extraordinarily rare, it's killed six boys and young men this year. The spike in cases has health officials concerned, and they are predicting more cases in the future.

"This is definitely something we need to track," said Michael Beach, a specialist in recreational waterborne illnesses for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"This is a heat-loving amoeba. As water temperatures go up, it does better," Beach said. "In future decades, as temperatures rise, we'd expect to see more cases."

According to the CDC, the amoeba called Naegleria fowleri (nuh-GLEER-ee-uh FOWL'-erh-eye) killed 23 people in the United States, from 1995 to 2004. This year health officials noticed a spike with six cases — three in Florida, two in Texas and one in Arizona. The CDC knows of only several hundred cases worldwide since its discovery in Australia in the 1960s.

In Arizona, David Evans said nobody knew his son, Aaron, was infected with the amoeba until after the 14-year-old died on Sept. 17. At first, the teen seemed to be suffering from nothing more than a headache.

"We didn't know," Evans said. "And here I am: I come home and I'm burying him."

After doing more tests, doctors said Aaron probably picked up the amoeba a week before while swimming in the balmy shallows of Lake Havasu, a popular man-made lake on the Colorado River between Arizona and California.

Though infections tend to be found in southern states, Naegleria lives almost everywhere in lakes, hot springs, even dirty swimming pools, grazing off algae and bacteria in the sediment.

Beach said people become infected when they wade through shallow water and stir up the bottom. If someone allows water to shoot up the nose — say, by doing a somersault in chest-deep water — the amoeba can latch onto the olfactory nerve.

The amoeba destroys tissue as it makes its way up into the brain, where it continues the damage, "basically feeding on the brain cells," Beach said.

People who are infected tend to complain of a stiff neck, headaches and fevers. In the later stages, they'll show signs of brain damage such as hallucinations and behavioral changes, he said.

Once infected, most people have little chance of survival. Some drugs have stopped the amoeba in lab experiments, but people who have been attacked rarely survive, Beach said.

"Usually, from initial exposure it's fatal within two weeks," he said.

Researchers still have much to learn about Naegleria. They don't know why, for example, children are more likely to be infected, and boys are more often victims than girls.

"Boys tend to have more boisterous activities (in water), but we're not clear," Beach said.

In central Florida, authorities started an amoeba phone hot line advising people to avoid warm, standing water and areas with algae blooms. Texas health officials also have issued warnings.

People "seem to think that everything can be made safe, including any river, any creek, but that's just not the case," said Doug McBride, a spokesman for the Texas Department of State Health Services.

Officials in the town of Lake Havasu City are discussing whether to take action. "Some folks think we should be putting up signs. Some people think we should close the lake," city spokesman Charlie Cassens said.

Beach cautioned that people shouldn't panic about the dangers of the brain-eating bug. Cases are still extremely rare considering the number of people swimming in lakes. The easiest way to prevent infection, Beach said, is to use nose clips when swimming or diving in fresh water.

"You'd have to have water going way up in your nose to begin with" to be infected, he said.

David Evans has tried to learn as much as possible about the amoeba over the past month. But it still doesn't make much sense to him. His family had gone to Lake Havasu countless times. Have people always been in danger? Did city officials know about the amoeba? Can they do anything to kill them off?

Evans lives within eyesight of the lake. Temperatures hover in the triple digits all summer, and like almost everyone else in this desert region, the Evanses look to the lake to cool off.

It was on David Evans' birthday Sept. 8 that he brought Aaron, his other two children, and his parents to Lake Havasu. They ate sandwiches and spent a few hours splashing around.

"For a week, everything was fine," Evans said.

Then Aaron got the headache that wouldn't go away. At the hospital, doctors first suspected meningitis. Aaron was rushed to another hospital in Las Vegas.

"He asked me at one time, 'Can I die from this?'" David Evans said. "We said, 'No, no.'"

On Sept. 17, Aaron stopped breathing as his father held him in his arms.

"He was brain dead," Evans said. Only later did doctors and the CDC determine that the boy had been infected with Naegleria.

"My kids won't ever swim on Lake Havasu again," he said.

___

On the Net:

More on the N. fowleri amoeba:

www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dpd/parasites/naegleria/factsht_naegleria.htm#what

My new do!

2007-09-13T20:03:00.000-07:00

So it was finally time to dye my hair red again! I'm trying a new brand, Garnier Fructise. Looks like it'll be brilliant enough. I can't for the life of me remember the coloring brand I used previously that just did not come out as bright red as it said it would on the box, so I had to do it over again with a semi-permanent red dye just to keep me happy temporarily. This weekend is my cousin Kitty's wedding so it's going to be a lot of fun with meeting lots of new people and lots of partying. Boy will I be tired!

I'm leaving the Bay Area Friday morning at 10am, so that I get up there relatively early, can unpack the car, get kitty settled in our room and take a nap and rest. Cocktails and appetizers are from 5:30-8pm at Jake's on the Lake - a restaurant/bar in Tahoe City. Then Sat at 3pm is the wedding with cocktails and the ceremony by the lake, then dinner at the club, Chamber's Landing, which I've never been to either. It's my moms' and my job to make the women's bathroom look nicer than it is - because the bathrooms available during the ceremony and cocktail hour before dinner will be the pool bathrooms, which are pretty dinky according to my mom who has already checked them out. So we're going to spruce them up a bit as much as possible. No need to on the guy's bathroom - I don't think men really care about things like that much.

Then Sunday is a very fancy (whatever that means) brunch that Noah (the groom), his parents are hosting at their place that they have rented in Tahoe Shores which is right next to Tahoe Tavern, where our cabin is. I know a lot of people then have to go home after that but I'm really excited for tommorrow because my brother is coming up as well and can stay until Tuesday, which is when I'm heading home anyway :) So yay! I didn't get to see him on his birthday because it was way too hot in San Marcos for me at the time so I'll get 4 whole days with him. Should be fun! Then we are hosting a Sunday evening BBQ at our cabin in Tahoe Tavern for anyone who is still there - we know for sure my aunt and uncle, Graham and Jill, maybe Kitty and Noah, but not sure of their plans, if they are going to leave right away on their honeymoon or wait.

So lots of fun things. There is also a big Bark Fest art show over at Squaw Village Sat and Sun so I'm going to try to go over on Sunday between brunch and dinner to check that out - supposed to be tons of artists that do all types of art with animals - mostly cats and dogs the brochure says but there may be other focal animals as well. Someday I want to do custom drawings of animals/pets for people and I also want to customize model horses - paint someone's horse onto a model horse. I've actually already done one so perfectly, my ex-friend JUanita, who recently disowned me as her ex-best friend - I had known her since the 1st grade and suddenly she went all psychotic on me and accused me of doing all kinds of things that I would never even do and distorted the facts and invented all of these lies about me and 'claimed' that she was going to tell everyone in the Bay Area horse world. Whatever. Go ahead and keep fabricating your little bullshit lies. You're only doing damage to yourself, obviously you've never been the real best friend that I really needed and you've been pretty flaky in the past as well and as I think back on it, I can definetly see some warning signs, which I had not ignored but instead just tucked into the back of my brain for safe keeping and future reference. So it was upsetting at first but then I was pretty strong and able to move past it pretty quickly and obviously she didn't get far if she at all went around telling people bullshit lies about me, because I've never heard about it again. But I had painted her horse onto a model and it was perfect. Then I gave it to her before taking a picture of it and asked her to take a pic and send it to me. That should have been one of my warning signs, when I kept asking her nicely to do it and she kept saying that she would and I never got a picture sent. And it wasn't like she didn't have any time to do that for me either.

So I have to start over and I need to scour the internet and find people who would be willing to give me their Breyer model horse lots for free or pretty cheap. Okay, time to go wash my hair out. Should be pretty cool this time and last pretty long. Because there's a lot of read in my hair anyway, when I color it, the color stays in pretty long, even after 3 months or so! I did do a bit too many things today, and pushed myself a bit too hard, but I hope that by getting plenty of sleep and rest and now that I'm on a regular routine of taking supplements morning and nighttime, that I can prevent a flare, since I just came off of one Wednesday which was for about a week.

Beware in 2008 of GE Sugar! Crap!

2007-09-12T22:47:00.001-07:00

GENETICALLY ENGINEERED SUGAR TO HIT STORES IN 2008
American Crystal, a large Wyoming-based sugar company, who ironically have launched an "organic" line of their sugar,and several other leading U.S. sugar providers have announced they will be sourcing their sugar from genetically engineered (GE) sugar beets beginning this year and arriving in stores in 2008. Like GE corn and GE soy, products containing GE sugar will not be labeled as such. Since half of the granulated sugar in the U.S. comes from sugar beets, a move towards biotech beets marks a dramatic alteration of the U.S. food supply. These sugars, along with GE corn and soy, are found in many conventional food products, so consumers will be exposed to genetically engineered ingredients in just about every non-organic multiple-ingredient product they purchase.

The GE sugar beet is designed to withstand strong doses of Monsanto's controversial broad spectrum Roundup herbicide. Studies indicate farmers planting "Roundup Ready" corn and soy spray large amounts of the herbicide, contaminating both soil and water. Farmers planting GE sugar beets are told they may be able to apply the herbicide up to five times per year. Sugar beets are grown on 1.4 million acres by 12,000 farmers in the U.S. from Oregon to Minnesota.

Meanwhile candy companies like Hershey's are urging farmers not to plant GE sugar beets, noting that consumer surveys suggest resistance to the product. In addition the European Union has not approved GE sugar beets for human consumption.

Take action now to stop Genetically Engineered Sugar:
http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_7031.cfm

I for one am a bit freaked out about this, but I'll know to read labels or just stick to the sugar I already buy, like Trader Joe's organic sugar. Why switch labels from something safe to something potentially scary and unhealthy? So be careful out there!!

Cool lava tubes accessable in and around Mt. St. Helens :)

2007-09-12T22:27:00.001-07:00

CRAIG HILL; The News Tribune
Published: August 30th, 2007 06:52 AM

Enlarge image
RUSS CARMACK/The News Tribune
A father-son outing takes John Leischner of Selah and 9-year-old Ryan to Boulder Cave.

Enlarge image
Devils Creek waterfall flows at the cave’s entrance.

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Observation decks dot Boulder Cave’s.
Kids love caves. Bats, bears, Batman. No telling what you’ll find in a cave.

That’s precisely why every year Teresa Vickel of Yakima and her friends take their kids to Boulder Cave near Chinook Pass.

“The kids love the idea of exploring a cave,” Vickel said as she entered the cave. “And the parents think it’s pretty cool, too.”

Doug Jenkins of the Naches Ranger District has hiked through the 200-foot tunnel dozens of times.

“The kids are always saying, ‘Maybe I’ll see a bat,’” Jenkins said. “And when they get in the middle of the cave where it is really dark, they try to scare each other.

“Plus, I think people just think it’s a unique experience to walk in one end of a cave and out the other.”

Boulder Cave is one of just a handful of easily accessed caves in the Cascades and one of only four you can actually explore.

And, fortunately for children, all the caves are family friendly.

Each trip requires a $5 Northwest Forest Pass per vehicle. The passes are available at ranger stations and online at nwpubliclands.org. Don’t forget your flashlight.

Brave the caves: Five to explore

APE CAVE

This 2 1/4-mile lava tube is the king of Washington caves. Formed by an eruption 2,000 years ago, Ape Cave is the only one of the more than 50 lava tubes around Mount St. Helens that can be visited without special permission.

The cave can provide an adventure for your kids, regardless of their age and durability. The lower cave is an easy walk and can be accessed by a staircase near the parking lot. If you are looking for a hardier challenge, you can walk the length of the cave, scrambling over large rock piles as you go.

Forest rangers recommend 21/2 hours to explore the entire cave. If you go, rangers suggest taking three light sources and spare batteries. Sturdy shoes, warm clothes and a helmet are also recommended.

Hiking distance: Up to four miles.

Directions: Follow Highway 503 through Cougar and continue on Forest Service Road 90. Seven miles past Cougar, turn left on FS Road 83. After two more miles, turn left on FS Road 8303 and continue to the trailhead.

Info: Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument, 1-360-247-3900.

BIG FOUR ICE CAVES

These caves are a popular family destination most of the time, but if your children aren’t nimble you might want to store it away for next summer. Last winter’s flooding washed out the bridge over the Stillaguamish River, leaving just a log for visitors to scurry across.

“It’s OK for older kids, teenagers,” said Diane Boyd of Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest. “I’ve seen young kids up there, but we are not recommending it right now.”

Boyd says the bridge likely won’t be fixed until next year.

The caves are carved under the snow banks of Big Four Mountain by wind and water each summer.

But there’s one big catch to enjoying these caves. You can’t go inside.

“It’s not safe,” Boyd said. “They are natural, and they naturally collapse every year. People have been killed in the ice cave.

“You can enjoy the caves without going in.”

Hiking distance: Two miles.

Directions: From Granite Falls, turn left on Mountain Loop Highway and continue through Verlot. Find the trailhead about 14 miles past Verlot.

Info: Darrington Ranger District, 360-691-7791.

BOULDER CAVE

Not only does Boulder Cave draw hiking families, but also it’s popular with bats.

Don’t expect to see any bats on your trip. The crush of people exploring the 200-foot-long cave each summer keeps the bats in hiding. But in the winter the bats – about 65 – return. The cave is closed Nov. 1 to April 1 to protect them.

Jenkins of the Naches Ranger District says visitors should stay on the trail in the cave and not explore its chambers. He also recommends good shoes, especially if you are going to explore Devils Creek, which runs through the cave all the way to the parking area.

There is a flat, natural waterslide in the creek below the caves and a small waterfall above the cave.

“It’s a perfect little playground for kids,” Teresa Vickel of Yakima said.

But be careful, Jenkins said. Some visitors have thrown glass bottles in the creek from the cliffs overlooking the gorge. “I definitely wouldn’t go in the creek with bare feet,” Jenkins said. He also urges parents to keep their children from climbing on the rocks in the caves and from getting too close to the edge of the cliff along the trail approaching the cave.

Hiking distance: 1.5 miles.

Directions: Follow Highway 410 over Chinook Pass. Turn south at the Boulder Cave sign between Mileposts 95 and 96 and continue to the trailhead at Boulder Cave Campground.

Info: Naches Ranger District, 1-509-653-1400.

ICE CAVE

This is a lava tube formed by an ancient eruption of Mount Adams. Ice forms in the cave each year, leaving huge frozen stalactites and stalagmites and a chilly place for children to play.

A staircase accesses the cave.

“It’s a neat place for kids as long as you don’t let them climb down into the second part of the lava tube,” said Gerry Harding, a Gifford Pinchot National Forest ranger. “You should have a hard hat and a flashlight to go in there.”

Another nearby cave experience is the Natural Bridges. There isn’t a cave here anymore, but this ancient lava tube has collapsed, leaving two natural bridges.

“Kids like walking across the bridges,” Harding said. “Most people visit the caves and the bridges on the same trip.”

Hiking distance: 1/4 mile for each.

Directions: Follow Highway 141 through Trout Lake as the road turns to Forest Service Road 24. Six miles past Trout Lake turn left on Road 301 and continue to the trailhead.

Info: Mount Adams Ranger District, 1-509-395-3400.

LAYSER CAVE

This small cave was discovered 25 years ago by ranger Tim Layser while he was working in Gifford Pinchot National Forest near Randle. But this cave is not new.

Scientists found stone tools and animal bones in the cave. They believe the cave was used as a shelter and to store meat for more than 7,000 years.

The cave is only 32 feet deep and easy enough to explore without a flashlight.

The short trail and the cave entrance have interpretive signs that supply more history on the cave.

Hiking distance: 450 yards.

Directions: From U.S. 12 in Randle, turn south on Highway 131. After a mile, turn left at the sign for the Cispus Center. After seven miles turn left at the Layser Cave sign and continue up the short, steep dirt road to the trailhead.

Info: Cowlitz Valley Ranger District, 1-360-497-1100.

medicare prescription drug rant

2007-09-11T18:18:00.000-07:00

So regarding Medicare, I'm wondering who else here is in the same boat that I am in - meaning, you don't pay a premium for Medicare and you don't have to deal with the Donut Hole issue. In other words, just last month I suddenly was no longer paying for many of my prescriptions. particularly my triplicates - the Percocet and MS Contin are now free and the others: Soma, Ultram ER etc are still $3.15 or so. My question is, has anyone experienced any kind of limit put on their medication in the last month. I just went to get my MS Contin refill last week and I was going to run out by today but didn't think there would be a problem. But suddenly after having taken MS Contin since March of this year, it was suddenly a problem for Medicare to pay for it. They are now limiting me to 120 pills instead of 180 (I don't need 180 but my doctor wants me to have as big of a stockpile of meds as I can, so the extra amount is always a good help for that). AND on top of that, they suddenly had a problem with it having to be brand. Well, sorry, but generics for my pills that count - the heavy pain killers, don't do jack for me so I can only take brand. And why is there suddenly an issue. Of course, my doctor's office was supposed to take care of this for me and when I called on Monday they still hadn't, even though I said I was going to run out on Tuesday. I ended up calling AARP who I have my prescription plan through and fixing the problem myself, so I just picked up 120 pills with teh brand name. But the woman said they had just put a limit on the medication, but couldnt' tell me exactly why. It would be great if they could put out some kind of notice, telling you that now these drugs on this list now have certain limitations, etc.

Another problem that we just discovered, is that when I finally had my disability for a year and got my Medicare, in august of 06, no one told me that if I had other insurance, I needed to call them and switch that insurance over to a supplemental insurance. No one told me I had a 3 month limit and in that amount of time, that was what needed to be done. Well shit! My mom called Blue Cross yesterday because every two months - when my dad pays my bill - the price keeps going up and up, for no particular reason at all. I dont' want to lose Blue Cross as my alternative back up insurance because one day I plan to not need Medicare anymore and if I go away from Blue Cross, I'll never be able to get it again and it might be nearly impossible for me to get any type of insurance on my own, because of my pre-existing conditions. So my mom calls to see what the deal is and the guy is so rude, talking so fast and eating his lunch while he's talking, making these gross chewing noises. Gees! What is wrong with people?? So she finally finds out that this needed to happen a year ago and that I'm basically shit out of luck - meaning that if I switch Blue Cross to be my supplemental insurance, that I won't have prescription coverage for 3 months, until january. Now, yes Medicare pays most of my prescriptions, except one - my Klonopin - this is not a med that I can change, as others like it have not worked the same way. The problem is that I can't get it refilled until the 19th of Sept and I only get #30 a month, so I'm hoping that if I explain the situation to my doctor, he can tweak my prescription and write it for at least double the amount. I use it to sleep and also when I'm having panic attacks and really bad days. So I don't take it too often but I can't not have it around as it is a great lifesaver when I do need it.

I just don't get the system at all. But I think what we're going to do is just wait until I can get my Klonopin refill on the 19th, then when my parents are back from Tahoe on the 24th, my mom will call and get Blue CRoss switched to supplemental so the bill for over $400 which is due Oct 10th, doesn't have to be paid. I hate that I can't pay it myself but my parents swore that their kids would always have insurance, because it's one thing that is pretty hard to get once you've lost it.

I still can't afford to get Actiq, the drug that would normally keep me out of the ER when I flare up pretty severely, I have one left! Blue CRoss no longer covers it - I used to be able to get it from them at $10 a pop. But Medicare says they won't pay for it for me because it's prescribed mainly to people with cancer. What a bunch of bullshit!?! My pain is certainly at the cancer pain level, if not higher at times. (I'm not trying to compare myself to someone else) - but....come on! What the fuck?? I'm so pissed and ticked off that me as a pain patient is being denied certain medications that could save me from much sufferign, because the makers of Actiq won't add chronic pain to their list of uses for the drug. Actiq is Fentanyl, but I can't use it in the patch form, unfortunately - makes me severely nauseous even at the lowest dose. But the lozenge pops are wonderful! If I had to pay out of pocket, which I did once when I got my workman's comp money - I bought 30 pops for over $2000. It was insane! I think I would have to pay $40 a piece for them or something ridiculous like that. And the company used to have a advocate system that would help you appeal to your insurance if they weren't willing to pay for it for a chronic pain condition but the 800# no longer works or is out of service and you can't get anywhere online. We definetly need more advocates to help us - especially since I can't tolerate the stress involved in dealing with insurance companies and certain doctors, etc. I mean, we have advocates to help you when applying for SSI and SSDI but not for getting medications and dealing with insurance?? How does that make sense?

Anyway, that's my rant for the day.

Please do the dishes - parents don't get it!

2007-09-09T01:16:00.000-07:00

So I'm sick of my parents, mainly my mother, not getting that when I'm flaring and yes I've told her/him which specific body parts are currently killing me - tonight happens to be that I have these huge bundles of knots in either shoulder, up on top of the blade and it's the same muscle that goes down along either side of my spine and back up my neck to my head. The knots and muscles will not relax, some heat is helping but nothing else is working - my Soma is just making me sleepy and at least I got a nap in before bed.

But before dinner, I told them both what was going on because they don't get it when I say that I'm 'flaring'. That should be an indication that I'm in more pain than normal - I feel like they just ignore the reality of my situation and go about their lives with no concern about mine. The only thing my mom did today was offer me to heat up a shoulder wrap but then after dinner, I'm nauseous, on the couch with a ice pack and bundled up, not moving - my says, good night and oh by the way, I hope you won't be surprised that we're leaving you the dishes to do! What the fuck??! I think. What part of my shoulders and neck are killing me and why can't she connect the dots and know that my shouders are connected to my arms and those aren't working right because of the pain in my shoulders?? Now you're expecting me to be able to do the dishes, which involves lifting pretty heavy plates and hot water and greasy food. Sounds exactly like what I want to be doing on top of my pain. I'm just astonished. I don't understand at all why two very abled human beings can't take over chores like dishes from someone who normally does them (yes, I usually do the dishes but NOT when i'm hurting so much!). Do I really need to make a list of all of the things I shouldn't be doing when I'm in any kind of pain that is above normal? I guess so! I just don't know what to do anymore! I'm sick of this bullshit!

So if any fibro people have any suggestions for dealing with parents, please fill me in. Yes, I still live with my parents - moved home two summers ago after having lived with my boyfriend for 3 years - he's up in Oregon now and it sucks but this is what I needed at the tiem. I'm seriously looking into moving to the Portland area now, as I'm one of the few lucky Fibro people who can actually stand the cold AND I do better with cold weather and rain. I can't stand and I actually get sick now from the heat + humidity or mugginess, which we've been having here in sucky California - yes, I hate this state now. I dont' want to live here anymore, I want to be where it is green all the time and I don't have to make an effort to stay out of the sun much and people are nice :) But in the meantime, I still have ot deal with my non-understanding conditionally loving parents - who of course would deny not loving me unconditionally but it's true, that they do love under their rules, their conditions, when I'm in their home. It's stressful and it sucks and my only positive result is that they are gone at least one week each month, sometimes longer, so I get the house to myself very often. That is my trade off for the time being. Come beginning of the new year of 2008, I will be taking a trip to Portland to check it out, hang out with old friends who are there now and seeing where I can move to.

New Great White Shark at Monterey - yay!!!!

2007-09-08T19:56:00.000-07:00

I'm so happy to read that Monterey Bay Aquarium has a great white again. I saw their last one and he was a cutie! This one is about the same size I think and hopefully will be staying in residence for a while. A good excuse to get off my butt and drive down there for a day visit, since I am a member and can get in for free and it takes my mind off of my pain :) I love the sharkies :)
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For only the third time since 2004, we have a young white shark [Online Field Guide] in the Outer Bay exhibit. He arrived on August 28, and will remain in the million-gallon exhibit as long as he's in good health and hasn't grown too large for us to return safely to the wild.

Like our first shark in 2004, he was caught accidentally in commercial fishing gear. Like our second shark in 2006, he's a young male: just 4-feet, 9-inches long and weighing 67 ½ pounds. As with both of the other young white sharks, he was kept in an ocean holding pen off Malibu in Southern California until we observed him feeding and navigating well in the confines of the pen.

Our first shark was with us for 6 � months; our second, for 4 � months. Both were successfully returned to the wild, and the tracking tags they carried documented their journeys back in the ocean. We've tagged 10 other young sharks in the wild in Southern California waters as part of our white shark field project, and support research to track the migrations of adult white sharks tagged off the Farallon Islands and Point A�o Nuevo on California's central coast.

You can meet the white shark in person when you visit, or try to spot him on our Outer Bay Cam as he swims in the exhibit. We'll post regular online updates on how he's doing.

Why White Sharks Need Our Help

Why White Sharks Need Our Help
Overfishing, trophy hunting, habitat destruction—all have contributed to a devastating decline in the white shark population worldwide. Here at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, we're working to turn the tide. We're learning more about white sharks and supporting policies to protect them in the wild. You can help.
Donate now to help save sharks and the oceans they live in.

>We Have Lots to Learn about White Sharks We're Learning a Lot
Observing a white shark face to face is exciting for visitors—and helpful for scientists. But it's just a small part of our white shark research project. Studying white sharks in the wild is even more important and intriguing. Together with our research partners, we're learning more every day about their habits, their travels, their unique and irreplaceable role in the ocean ecosystem.
Find out more about our research.

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Here is a pic I took of the second shark that was there:

Old guy friend rescues hiker lost on Mt Baldy

2007-08-31T22:09:00.000-07:00

This happened a while ago but I just happened to watch the video tonight. Congrats John! Way to go! He's the blond short haired guy in orange on the video.

http://www.myfoxla.com/myfox/pages/Home/Detail?contentId=3358280
&version=1&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=VSTY&pageId=1.1

Meteor shower possible Sat morning!!!

2007-08-31T19:07:00.001-07:00

Earth to Hit Aurigid Meteors?
August 23, 2007
by Joe Rao

Skywatchers were out in force for the familiar Perseid meteor shower peaking in mid-August at the dark of the Moon. So why bother with a shower that almost nobody has heard of coming two weeks later in bright moonlight?

Because the Aurigids are this summer’s skywatching wildcard.

The Perseids are the "Old Faithful" of meteor displays, whereas most years the Aurigids produce little or nothing. But three times in the last century, skywatchers were surprised by a short-lived burst of bright meteors emanating from the direction of Auriga early on the morning of September 1st. Circumstances appear excellent for a repeat in 2007, with a small chance that the shower could turn extraordinary. So well-positioned meteor observers — those in far-western North America and Hawaii — are going on high alert.

Surprise!

No Aurigid outburst has yet been photographed (hint, hint). But during the 1998 Leonid fireball shower, Lorenzo Lovato caught four bright meteors in this single 9-minute, wide-field exposure. One prediction suggests that any shower on the morning of September 1st would be especially fireball-rich.
Lorenzo Lovato
The first known Aurigid outburst came in 1935, when on the night of August 31–September 1, astronomers Cuno Hoffmeister and Arthur Teichgraeber of Sonneberg, Germany, witnessed an unexpected and moderately strong meteor display. It appeared to radiate from a spot near the star Beta Aurigae, not far from Capella. Orbital expert Vladimir Guth immediately suggested that the meteors came from Comet Kiess (C/1911 N1), which followed a similar path through space and last came through in September 1911. It has an orbital period of approximately 2,000 years.

Then in 1986, meteor watcher Istvan Tepliczky of Tata, Hungary, went out on September 1st around 1:00 a.m. local time (0:00 Universal Time) for a night of observing. "Just after 1:00 UT", he wrote, "I was an eyewitness of a very spectacular phenomenon. Very bright yellow meteors began to fall; all of them left long trains... Around 1:20 UT I detected meteors every one or two minutes." The shower tapered off slightly after 1:30, and he saw his last meteor at 2:12 UT.

The Aurigids made their most recent appearance on September 1, 1994, caught by experienced meteor observers Robert Lunsford and George Zay at Descanso, California. Considering how few observers our knowledge of these events comes from, Aurigid displays may have happened in other years without being noticed.

Encore in 2007?

At the August 2006 International Astronomical Union meeting, Peter Jenniskens of the SETI Institute’s Carl Sagan Center announced that the Aurigids are likely to come to life again this September 1st. He based his forecast on calculations by himself and Jérémie Vaubaillon of Caltech, and on earlier work done in collaboration with meteor astronomer Esko Lyytinen of Finland. Working from positions of Comet Kiess recorded in 1911, they determined that prior to that appearance, the comet last swept around the Sun in roughly 82 BC.

At that time the comet should have released a trail of fine rubble following along its path. Some of this comet dross from more than 2,000 years ago, the astronomers found, should only now be completing its first revolution around the Sun, decades behind the comet. Jenniskens showed that the Aurigid outbursts of 1935, 1986, and 1994 all arose when Earth passed through this one lengthy debris trail. And now the stage is set again.

When and Where

The Far West is the place to be for watching whether the Aurigids erupt before dawn on September 1st. The shower’s peak is predicted for about 4:37 a.m. PDT. However, the time prediction could be a little off, the shower may last up to an hour, and some of the meteors may be bright enough to show through a lot of twilight. So observers somewhat east of the prime area could have a chance as well.
S&T Illustration
On Saturday morning, September 1st, around 11:37 UT (plus or minus 20 minutes), Jenniskens and Vaubaillon expect Earth to pass smack through this one-revolution rubble trail from Comet Kiess. The timing favors far-western North America, as shown on the map at right. In this region 11:37 UT falls before the first light of dawn, with Auriga very high in the northeast (roughly 60° or 70° up) — ideal circumstances.

For Hawaii, the radiant will be much lower at that time (1:37 a.m. Hawaii Standard Time). So any shower members seen will be earthgrazers that skim far across the top of the atmosphere nearly horizontally and leave long, colorful, persistent trains (as observed in 1986 and 1994).

Unfortunately, the rest of North America will be in bright twilight or daylight. Like the previous outbursts, the upcoming display should be short-lived, probably lasting no more than an hour or so.

Comet Crumbs

"What makes this shower so special," notes Jenniskens, "is the opportunity to see bits and pieces of the comet’s original crust." Long-period comets have just recently returned from cold storage in the Oort Cloud and are still covered by a crust that resulted from 4.5 billion years of exposure to cosmic rays. When the comet returns to the inner solar system, that crust is crumbled and creates peculiar meteors. "The only other time that a dust trail of a long-period comet was investigated, during the 1995 Alpha Monocerotid outburst, it was found that the meteoroids had lost all their volatile sodium minerals," continues Jenniskens. "There will be no other chance to study long-period-comet dust trails in the next three decades."

A drawback will be the bright waning gibbous Moon, 84% illuminated in nearby Aries. But because the Aurigids ram into our atmosphere at exceptionally high speed (66 kilometers, or 41 miles, per second), and because the particles are predicted to be relatively large, any shower should be rich in bright meteors, with many in the range of magnitude +1 to 0. "So," says Jenniskens, "the Moon probably won’t dim much of the display."

As to how many you might see, the safest forecast is perhaps 20 to 30 per hour. But Lyytinen is predicting many more, with a zenithal hourly rate (ZHR) reaching a few hundred. Lyytinen also expects the peak to arrive a few minutes earlier than Jenniskens and Vaubaillon: around 11:20 UT.

"I would predict a ZHR of 300," he says, "but with an uncertainty of 1 to 3; this would mean something between about 100 and 1,000. Let’s hope this will be around 1,000!"

Sun is making waves!!!

2007-08-31T19:01:00.000-07:00

This is really cool:

The Sun is Making Waves
For decades solar physicists have wrestled with why the Sun's atmosphere (the corona) has a temperature of millions of degrees, when the solar surface below it is merely thousands of degrees hot.

Magnetic loop on the Sun
A solar flare in September 2005, recorded by the TRACE spacecraft, sends a magnetized loop of superheated gas arching high into the Sun's atmosphere.
Stanford-Lockheed Institute for Space Research
They thought they had the answer when, in 1942, Swedish physicist Hannes Alfvén predicted the existence of waves that could pump energy into the corona as they propagated upward from the photosphere. But no one had been able to observe these Alfvén waves because instrument technology wasn't up to snuff yet.

Now a team headed by Steven Tomcyzk of NCAR's High Altitude Observatory has managed to record and measure the elusive waves. The researchers (including a high-school science teacher from Massachusetts) used a new instrument that rapidly maps brightness and polarization over a large swath of corona in near-infrared light. They made the observations two years ago; it's taken them this long to puzzle it all out.

As Tomcyzk's team reports in the August 31st issue of Science, the waves propagate upward into the corona along magnetic field lines at speeds of roughly 1,000 miles per second, about 10 times faster than the speed of sound there. (That's not the velocity of the superheated gas but rather of the waves themselves — think of the fast-moving ripple created when you flick the end of a taut rope.)

The bad news is that the Alfvén waves aren't nearly powerful enough to fuel the corona's incredible heat. Something at least 10,000 times more energetic is needed. The good news, however, is that scientists now have a powerful new technique to probe the solar corona. It turns out that the waves' propagation speed depends directly on the strength of the magnetic field around them. So the new instrument's images, when combined with other measurements of solar vibrations (helioseismology), can be used to estimate the intensity and orientation of the coronal magnetic field.

August 28th Lunar Eclipse

2007-08-30T19:04:00.000-07:00

So I hope you all saw the beautiful eclipse this week. It was just amazing. Unfortunately I found out too late that the Chabot Space and Science center was having this massive blow out, all-night long party with telescope viewing for it. Oh well, next time! However I did instead stay up and played WoW until about 1:30am, got into bed and watched a movie and then got back up at 2:30am to get my dad up, who wanted to see it as well. My dad was already up, apparently he's up every night from 2-3:30am. Gees! Well, I am too lots of times I suppose. So we got up and couldn't see the moon from the deck so we went out into the courtyard to look and found the moon perfectly. It was amazing seeing it almost covered. We turned off the bright night light that is on at night and my dad got his binoculars. It was just amazing, so beautiful and red/orange. Amazing images in the binoculars as it was quickly covered up for the full eclipse. So I read that early explorers who orginally thought the earth was flat, quickly realized from watching total lunar eclipses, that the earth was in fact, round. Also, another amazing thing about this months' eclipse is that the moon is supposed to be passing through some kind of solar meteor shower during the entire timeframe and news reported that those with telescopes out, might be able to see lunar meteor impacts! I still havne't been able to find data or pics on that as of yet, but will post here if I do.

This is a lunar eclipse computer calculator, where you can find info on the eclipses and info on upcoming ones as well.
http://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/LunarEclipse.html

This was taken in California:

And this is a really cool artistic photo collage that someone did:

Pirate Bay doing a great job of pissing off the MPAA!

2007-08-27T16:18:00.000-07:00

How three Swedish geeks became Hollywood's Number One enemy

* Bobbie Johnson, technology correspondent
* Guardian Unlimited
* Saturday August 25 2007

Pirates of the Caribbean

Hollywood's image of piracy has been altered by the internet

Operating under the sign of a Jolly Roger, The Pirate Bay website hopes to evoke a buccaneer spirit: swashbuckling swordsmen, or perhaps the pirate radio stations of the 1960s. But as the internet's number one destination for illegal downloads, it has raised the hackles of the entertainment industry and elevated its founders to the top of Hollywood's most wanted list.

With more than two million visitors every day, The Pirate Bay has become one of the sharpest thorns in the side of the media business. Its controversial success has caused havoc in the music, TV and film industries.

Current top downloads include The Bourne Ultimatum, Die Hard 4.0 and Knocked Up — all showing in British cinemas, but available to watch on a computer screen for those willing to take the risk.

The three-year campaign to bring down the website is almost an epic of Hollywood proportions, sprinkled with high-flying lawyers and accusations of political extremism. And yet, so far, the chase has failed to bring the pirates down.

Despite their high profile, however, the men behind The Pirate Bay are not part of an organised crime syndicate. Instead, they are an unlikely trio of Swedish computer geeks who began their war with the media from a small room in Stockholm.

The group, who spoke exclusively to the Guardian, live like students in the suburbs of Sweden's major cities. They wake late and work into the night. The closest thing they have to an official headquarters is a desk on the suburban outskirts of Malmo — and that is simply because it has a working fax machine.

But as the most hated men in Hollywood, they said they have become used to the attention. "We get legal threats every day, or we used to," said Peter Sunde, 28, one of the site's main workers. "But we don't have a problem with them — we're just a search engine."

Fredrik Neij, a 29-year-old IT consultant, has a more prosaic view: "It's nice to be noticed," he smiled.

Chief among those angered by The Pirate Bay's popularity is the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), which represents the US film studios. It is waging war against the site, which it claims is costing billions in lost sales.

John Malcolm, executive vice-president of the MPAA, has railed against the trio, accusing them of cashing in on illegal activity. "The bottom line is that the operators of The Pirate Bay, and others like them, are criminals who profit handsomely by facilitating the distribution of millions of copyrighted creative works," he said.

Mr Sunde insists the site does not profit its founders, and money raised from advertising is used to cover expenses. Instead, he says, the team make their money from a variety of side projects and day jobs.

Filesharing and illegal downloading has been a big issue for media companies since the late 1990s. But while pioneering services such as Napster and Kazaa were closed down by the courts, the campaign against The Pirate Bay has failed to make a breakthrough.

The crux of the defence is that The Pirate Bay operates like any internet search engine: it points to downloads, rather than hosting any illegal content itself. Under Swedish law this has so far made it immune to prosecution.

"I don't like the word untouchable, but we feel pretty safe," said Mr Sunde. He thinks that European enmity towards the Bush administration has bolstered support. "The US government is losing popularity every day in Europe, and people don't want to see us give in to them."

Their apparent invulnerability to prosecution has made them heroes of the internet piracy movement, but not everybody feels the same way.

"I certainly don't see them as romantic pirates: it's out and out theft," says John Kennedy, chief executive of the international music industry body IFPI. "It's pure, ruthless greed — or total naivety."

But the group's supporters around the world say they are vexed with what they see as the "corruption" of the media industry.

"This is already happening — you cannot stop it," says Magnus Eriksson of Piratbyran, the Swedish thinktank which helped start the website in 2003. "But the thing is that the people who download the most are also the ones who spend the most on buying media. Media companies already know that they have to change."

The pirates suspect the campaign against them is gathering pace. Last year police raided the site and held Gottfried Svartholm, the third member of the group, for questioning. No charges resulted, but the site was offline for two days.

Lately critics have focused on potential political links, including one German failed attempt to link the organisation with far-right extremists.

More recently Swedish police said they were considering blocking the website because of a tip-off that some pages linked to images of child abuse. This, says Mr Sunde, was just an attempt to smear The Pirate Bay's reputation. "There were three files in question, but it turned out that none of them contained child porn," he said.

The group is adamant it is just a search engine, but Mr Kennedy rejects any analogy with traditional internet businesses. "When I sit down with Google they are prepared to talk about copyright issues," he says. "If I thought The Pirate Bay guys were doing something really new and clever, then we'd look at it — but there's no evidence of that."

Mr Sunde remains unmoved. He says piracy is a way of life on the internet. "I started off copying disks on my computer when I was eight or nine," he said. "You should never tell people where they can't go or what they can't do."

Lunar eclipse this week!!

2007-08-26T22:31:00.001-07:00

Mon Aug 27 - Tue Aug 28
Total Lunar Eclipse

Website

Schedule
Location Date and Time
high in the post-midnight sky
N/A
San Francisco, CA N/A
district: San Francisco

Mon Aug 27 (on the 28th at 2:52am (Good Night!))
Tue Aug 28 (2:52am (Good Morning!))

Description
"Close your eyes, breathe deeply, let your mind wander to a distant seashore: It's late in the day, and the western sun is sinking into the glittering waves. At your feet, damp sand reflects the twilight, while overhead, the deep blue sky fades into a cloudy mélange of sunset copper and gold, so vivid it almost takes your breath away.

A breeze touches the back of your neck, and you turn to see a pale full Moon rising into the night. Hmmm. The Moon could use a dash more color. You reach out, grab a handful of sunset, and drape the Moon with phantasmic light. Much better.

Too bad it's only a dream...

Early Tuesday morning, August 28th, the dream will come true. There's going to be a colorful lunar eclipse visible from five continents including most of North America"

- http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2007/03aug_dreamyeclipse.htm

New age art!!

2007-08-26T22:24:00.001-07:00

This I definetly have to go see!!

Dark Matters: Artists See The Impossible
Through a Glass, Very Darkly
By Jesse Nathan (Aug 24, 2007)

* Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA)
701 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA 94103 Map
415-978-2700

New technology always generates new art forms, mediums, and modes of exhibition. The rapid digitization of our globe -- with its accompanying technologies of hyper-communication, intimate surveillance and documentation -- stands as no exception. “Dark Matters” at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts addresses the information-technology drenched society we reside in head-on, uniting a range of artists, each one using a dramatically different medium to reveal the invisible and the shrouded.

Though the artwork is not intended, exclusively anyway, to leave us with a sinking, paranoid feeling, much of it does -- and beautifully so. There are the blurry-by-necessity photographs, for instance, of camera-wielding, self-described “cyberspace researcher” Trevor Paglen that target the governmental use of secrecy we’ve become accustomed to if not before then certainly during the eight year reign of Bush II and his Junta.

Taken 18-20 miles out from Tonopah Test Range (a classified U.S. military base in Nevada) because civilians are prohibited from getting any closer, Paglen’s hefty photographs shimmer before our eyes, huge, stark reminders of how little we’re allowed to see of the inner-workings of our own government and military. They are, reads the description on the wall beside the photographs “minimalist statements about what we can know” –- images of faint, almost unseeable things that “threaten to disappear from sight.”

Paglen’s service to the public and it’s right to know continues with a wall-to-wall list of code names used by the U.S. for secret operations from 2001-2007. Etched into the white walls glare hundreds of bizarre, double-speak-laden handles like Black Demon, Bent Pipe, Eastern Reasoner, Hairy Buffalo, Salty Script, and Wiley, monikers for who-knows-what. Paglen’s bone-chilling installation prods us to wonder: what else will we find out (maybe) long after the fact? What else is Big Brother up to?

Those questions, however, punch at us in precisely the way these artists want them to -- thrusting us in front of the sort of “dark matter” we rarely come face-to-face with, let alone to terms with. The curator’s exhibit statement, for example, decries a “culture of secrecy” at all levels of government, as well as “a concern that we are losing touch with reality [as] the digitization of most content...produces a situation where information loses a sense of relative importance.” Surrounded by “digital white noise,” reads the statement, we must turn to art – and this exhibit specifically -- to “reveal the hidden and obscured.”

Paglen’s work only marks the beginning of this exhibit’s disarming array of hair-raising artwork. Tucked in corners and hallways around the gallery, for instance, wait black phones on black tables. The brainchild of artist Kambui Olujmi these pieces simulate eavesdropping. Each phone bears a sign inviting a person to pick it up. Though the conversations are in (sometimes obscure) foreign languages, they are each discussions of traumatic events, filled with emotional hooks that allow us to know –- even across languages –- that we are peeping in on something painful and private. Again, our spines tingle as we come face-to-face -– or ear-to-ear, as it were -- with the technologies and practices the information-age has unleashed.

The exhibit continues with music, video, and other multimedia. The pieces touch on only some of the dark matters swirling just beneath our lives, exposed here for brief, chilling moments in this show. Installed and exhibited with meticulous attention to space and light and color, the exhibit grabs and shakes gorgeously, and leaves us looking over our shoulders for hours.

Dark Matters: Artists See The Impossible
at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
$7 regular/$5 seniors, students & teachers
FREE for YBCA Members

Pigeons to blame for bridge collapse??

2007-08-25T22:44:00.000-07:00

Pounded and strained by heavy traffic and weakened by missing bolts and cracking steel, the failed interstate bridge over the Mississippi River also faced a less obvious enemy: Our friend the pigeon.
Yahoo reports that inspectors began documenting the buildup of pigeon dung on the span near downtown Minneapolis about two decades ago. Experts are saying that the corrosive guano deposited all over the Interstate 35W span's framework helped the steel beams erode faster.

They have not decided what caused the collapse, but pigeon dung is one of many factors that played a part.

"There is a coating of pigeon dung on steel with nest and heavy buildup on the inside hollow box sections," inspectors wrote in a 1987-1989 report.

They installed screens in the hollow sections of the beams in 1996 in hopes of keeping the pigeons out. Unfortunately that did not stop the dropping from building up everywhere.

The droppings contain ammonia's and acids. If it isn't washed away it dries and becomes a concentrated salt. If water combines with that salt and ammonia, it creates electrochemical reactions that rust the steel.

"Every time you get a little bit of moisture there, you wind up having a little bit of electrochemistry occurring and you wind up with corrosion," said Langerman. "Over a long term, it might in fact cause structural weaknesses."

But he is not ready to say that pigeon droppings caused the collapse.

This is a common problem with bridges. For instance, The Colorado Department of Transportation spent so much time cleaning pigeon droppings off of bridges that they are beginning a two-year research project looking for ways to keep pigeons away from its spans.

"It can be damaging to our structures because it's slightly acidic and it has other compounds in it that can dissolve especially things like concrete," said Patricia Martinek, the agency's environmental research manager.

In Denver, the DOT pays environmental specialists to clean their bridges wearing biohazard suits with respirators due to fears about bird flu and other diseases.

The art of keeping pigeons off bridges can often include netting to block holes, spikes so they can't land, poisoning, or even shooting.

Meanwhile, the NTSB has issued an update on their findings about the bridge collapse. They are investigating whether chemicals used in an automated de-icing system had any corrosive properties.

Oh my gosh, that is so fucked up! Fucking pidgeons! See, they have no other purpose on earth except to destroy homes, bridges and other bird's habitats! Anyone need a pidgeon exterminator?? Hire me! I've currently been able to exterminate most of the large population of pidgeons that tried to make new homes under our houses and they aren't trying to come back! Heh! I hate pidgeons!

Science discovers big hole in space

2007-08-24T20:40:00.000-07:00

"Astronomers are surprised by a recent discovery of a space hole that is nearly a billion light years across. "Not only has no one ever found a void this big, but we never even expected to find one this size," said researcher Lawrence Rudnick of the University of Minnesota. Rudnick's colleague Liliya R. Williams also had not anticipated this finding. "What we've found is not normal, based on either observational studies or on computer simulations of the large-scale evolution of the universe," said Williams, also of the University of Minnesota.""

Wow, I know a really good use for that - throwing certain individuals into it - the president, the govt, bees, the two girls who purposely and SLOWLY jaywalked in front of my car today and then gave me the finger when I didn't come to a full stop. My god, you know - I have the right of way and where is a cop when you need one anyway??!!

Yes, I'm in a pissy, smart ass type mood. My parental units have returned and my mom is trying to make my life living here especially hard. My dad occasionally backs me up when he can but mom has always been #1 in the family. :( She just has to get her way. It's always a big joke in my family - my mom likes to say that it's 'her' car and it's 'her' couch but who bought it? My dad of course! So technically it's really his .

New migraine website just released!!

2007-08-24T03:31:00.000-07:00

So I for a while have been on the commitee for this group, helping to provide feedback on their new beta website. It was pretty awesome the way it was setup and now the actual site has been launched. for anyone who sufferes from Migraines or if you know someone who does, send them this information. It is such a great resource!

Greetings:

I’m happy let you know that we recently launched the WEGO Health Migraines and Women’s Health message boards and I wanted to invite you to join in the conversation. The boards were launched in advance of the corresponding content areas of WEGO Health, which are under development.

You’re among the first to see the message boards, so we would very much appreciate your feedback and participation.

To get started, please visit the registration page:

http://forums.wegohealth.com/forums/member/register/

Below are a few discussions on Migraines and Women’s Health issues that you may want to check out.

On Migraines:

Migraine Diets vs. Headache Diaries

http://forums.wegohealth.com/forums/viewthread/21/

Biofeedback for pain

http://forums.wegohealth.com/forums/viewthread/45/

Keeping your life going when you have migraines and kids

http://forums.wegohealth.com/forums/viewthread/46/

How do you define a “good” doctor?

http://forums.wegohealth.com/forums/viewthread/41/

On Women’s Health Issues:

Dealing with endometriosis

http://forums.wegohealth.com/forums/viewthread/80/

New forms of birth control

http://forums.wegohealth.com/forums/viewthread/96/

Menopause at age 26

http://forums.wegohealth.com/forums/viewthread/79/

Once again, please feel free to contact me with any questions or suggestions. I look forward to getting to know you in the community!

Cheers,

Adrienne

Adrienne Lavidor-Berman

Online Community Manager, WEGO Health

http://www.wegohealth.com

617 649 1502

adriennelb@wegohealth.com

Noise and illness

2007-08-24T03:28:00.000-07:00

This is very very interesting - may explain why I get so aggravated by the gardeners and their goddammed loud leaf blowers that not only make so much noise and keep me from my precious sleep but they also pollute and smell awful!

How noise causes illness

How could exposure to noise have such devastating effects on human health as causing cardiovascular disease?

Key to solving this puzzle is recognising that noise can create a form of chronic stress that keeps our bodies in a state of constant alert. Research published last year by Wolfgang Babisch of Germany's Federal Environmental Agency in Berlin shows that even when you are asleep, your ears, brain and body continue to react to sounds, raising levels of stress hormones such as cortisol, adrenalin and noradrenalin.

This makes evolutionary sense, as all animals need to be alert to threats even when they are asleep, so they can wake up and flee if necessary, says Andy Moorhouse, an acoustics researcher at the University of Salford, UK.

However, if these stress hormones are in constant circulation, they can cause long-term physiological changes that could be life-threatening. The end result can be anything from heart failure and strokes to high blood pressure and immune problems. "All this is happening imperceptibly, and this is the key," says Deepak Prasher of University College London, who collaborated on the WHO study. "Even when you think you're used to noise, these physiological changes are still happening," he says.

What's more, there are a wide range of sources of noise stress. Some are big and obvious, such as constant heavy traffic or aircraft taking off, while others are much more subtle and difficult to define as "pollution", yet can still cause intense anxiety and irritation. In the case of noisy neighbours, for example, stress might be triggered simply by knowing a neighbour is in, even if they are not being noisy at that point. "If you have no control over the noise, that's what creates anger and stress and causes people to tip over the edge," says Val Wheedon, a veteran campaigner against noise pollution in the UK and co-founder of the UK Noise Association. In such disputes, noise serves not only as an irritation, but symbolises perceived lack of consideration in others, priming the body for confrontation, Wheedon adds.

Noise can aggravate stress still further if it disturbs sleep, which can result in constant fatigue and outbursts of aggressiveness and irritability. People exposed to noise during their sleep have been shown to wake up more often and fidget more in their sleep - both indicators of sleep disruption.

There is also mounting evidence that excessive noise disrupts learning and education. As far back as 1975, studies by Arline Bronzaft in New York showed that the reading skills of children in classrooms next to noisy railways lagged three to four months behind those of their peers in quieter classrooms. More recently, Staffan Hygge of the Laboratory of Applied Psychology in Gävle, Sweden, demonstrated that the long-term memory recall of children in part of Munich, Germany, improved by 25 per cent after a nearby airport was closed (Psychological Science, vol 13, p 469). The recall ability of children living near the new airport deteriorated by the same amount once it opened.

Good resource for getting information on Fibromyalgia

2007-08-24T02:25:00.000-07:00

So Im pretty psyched, even though I can't sleep and am awake still at 2:30am. I just saw the first ever commercial - and not even a drug-promoted commerical - just an info commerical for Fibromyalgia. How cool is that!?! This is a major breakthrough because this is just one more step that is going to help to educate the public about this horrible illness. So I'm really happy! Keep your eyes peeled. Thanks to the NFA for putting it out too! If you want more info, check out their brand new site at: http://www.fibrohope.org/.

Help support the fight to find a cure and help promote awareness of this illness that so many more people suffer from than people even realize.

Watch horse trials on internet!

2007-08-24T02:07:00.001-07:00

Watch the Land Rover Burghley Horse Trials Live

Don’t miss a second of the action at the Land Rover Burghley Horse Trials in England where eight Americans will be contesting for the coveted £50,000 prize. For the first time, the Land Rover Burghley Horse Trials will be offering live webstream of the cross-country and show jumping worldwide September 1-2.

If you sign up before August 26, not only can you enjoy every minute of the 2007 event but you can also enjoy highlights of the 2006 event for free. There is also a special offer combining access to the webcast and a copy of the 2007 DVD after the competition is over.

Colorful commentary will be provided by some of the biggest names in the game, including:

—Alice Plunkett, Channel 4 Horse Racing Anchor, former eventer and wife of William Fox-Pitt;
—David O'Connor, Individual Sydney Olympic champion, World and Pan Am medalist, and winner of Badminton and Rolex Kentucky;
—Ian Stark, four-time Olympic Silver medalist, and triple Badminton champion; and
—Tina Cook, World and European Team medalist.

Visit www.burghley.tv to watch the action.

Stupid traffic light

2007-08-24T01:56:00.000-07:00

So what do you do when a traffic light refuses to turn green for you? I'm sure we have all wondered about that, like the question of whether or not you'd go through a red if you were sitting at an intersection in the middle of nowhere. Well the same thing happened to me tonight. I just dropped C off at Oakland Greyhound and was heading back to the freeway, was literally a block from the entrance, but sitting at this light right next to a gas station in the middle of ghetto Oakland. Not my ideal place to sit at a light. After about 3 minutes I realized that the light wasn't going to change. The red walk hand was up on the other way but had never been blinking like it was going to change. People kept coming up behind me but they all turned right so none of them were helping by sitting on the sensors either. I backed up and went to sit in the farthest left hand lane, thinking I could trigger the sensor. Nope! No good. Well shit! What the hell? I don't want to sit here and just keep waiting especially when it's perfectly clear that the light is not working properly. So I looked around for any cops or people, gave the light the bird and made my executive decision to go safely through the red light. I pulled out into the intersection slowly, looked both ways many times and sped across the intersection and prayed that no cops were sitting blocks down and had seen me do this. Of course, I would let them know that the light was broken and I had waited at least 10 minutes but did not feel safe sitting there in a shiny red BMW, which I'm sure can attract the wrong kind of attention. But no cops and I just got back onto the freeway and headed home. It was really weird, because that light has worked before, but it was really slow and retarded and took a bit longer than normal to realize that I was sitting waiting for it to change to green for me. Well at least I don't have to go back there for a while, so that is good. Sheesh!!!

The past four days of fun and stress

2007-08-24T01:35:00.000-07:00

Well overall I had a great week, even though I flared up too. A couple of times I was in such bad shape that I couldn't even move but my friend was nice enough to take really good care of me, give me massages when needed and cook me lots of healthy tasty meals :) I love home cooked meals. We mostly hung out, watched lots of movies, talked, went in the hot tub, he drove me around to my errands and pet sitting jobs and we relaxed. AND he helped me with getting ready for my art show this Sunday. Thank goodness he was here because I couldn't have gotten to where I am now without his help, since my folks are currently in Tahoe, returning Friday. So we made a ton of wine charms, I finished my earrings and found some nice paper to make earring backings, also printed out my label for my business name: Infinite Creations. I ordered more business cards beginning of last week, which I expect to get here tommorrow or Sat by the latest. I just need to make two more necklaces, two more bracelets and print out my Bio and custom orders information. I got my stands out of storage and also located the pretty mesh bags to put jewelry into when sold, just like the ones I use for my homemade bath salts. I'm also going to advertise that I'm going to donate 10% of my profit to an organization that is working on finding a cure and/or diagnostic test for Fibromyalgia. Any way I can spread the word about my illness, the better. I might also get some more pet sitting clients, since I'm using my personal business card. Decided against making an entirely new card just for my jewelry.

Yesterday after running errands and pet sitting, we went to pick up cat food and treats and saw the ice cream shop across the street and I'm always in the mood for ice cream. So we went to Tuckers, which is where some of you know the Rosenblum Zinfandel chip ice cream is made - which is my ultimate favorite flavor. Well guess what??!! They had it!! I was really psyched so I bought a quart of that and we also got cones too. Yum yum!

So today since it was C's last day, he really wanted to get the best burrito in the bay and I was dying to go play pinball and air hockey. So we ventured over to the Peninsula, back to our old stomping ground :) We went to Sunnyvale and stopped at Golfland, which has one of the best arcades that we know of. We at first were going to go to the Nickel Arcade in San Jose, but it was pretty far and then I remembered that they didn't have pinballs or other cool games, just silly ones and it's always really loud and full of screaming little brats. So we decided against that idea. Golfland is pretty nice, though when we stepped out of the car, Sunnyvale for some strange reason smelled like someone had set off a stinkbomb. Inside was much better. Golfland has a great mini-golf setup, which we've done before but we just wanted to do the arcade. I guess now they have deals during the week if you go at later times, after 6 or 7pm, you can get a play all, just for $5, which is a pretty good deal. The arcade only takes tokens and the bigger games are a $1 but some only take $.25 or .50. So we played Pinball - there was a new favorite, Spiderman, the set up was really cool, lots of flashy lights and tunnels, ramps, sumersault loops and such. Lots of fun and it gave me lots of do-overs for my lost balls. There was also Lord of the Rings but I'm getting really tired of that one, because a) it's in almost every single movie theater arcade, meaning I've played it quite a bit and b) it doesn't give you a do-over when your ball gets lost. Plus it got Tilted a lot and that was annoying too! They also had Monopoly but we had to limit what we spent so we didnt' play that one. Next we played Mario Kart - a fav of mine from Nintendo, it was fun to be in a big driver's seat version and I kicked ass both times :) They also had Puzzle Fighter which I really like but there was quite a wait since these asian kids kept hogging the game. Then they got really upset and pissy when I nabbed it because they had gotten up and walked across the room. Gees, deal! There was another puzzle type one but I can't remember the one now but you shoot different colored balls upwards, to knock off sets of three. I practiced and got it down. Some games I need to warm up on, like pinball and puzzle games and others, like air hockey, it's just permanently engrained in my brain on how to play :) Speaking of, I kicked some major butt at air hocket. I think it's due to play so much against my brother when we both lived down in San Diego. He plays really hard, really violent, so much so that he's garenteed to hit the puck so hard that it flys off the table at every game and you barely get a chance to hit it because you're so busy defending your goal. Well, fortunately I don't play that aggressively but I'm pretty darn good at defending my goal and getting it to go into the other side. Heh! That was a lot of fun and boy does my right arm hurt, just sore, but it was totally worth it :) I LOVE air hockey. My other favorite is After Burner but I havent' been able to find it anywhere. Bet I could find it in a big arcade but there are not that many left in the bay area unfortunately. There is however a massive arcade in Portland, so that is intriguing for a visit there :) I'm pretty good at any games that require strong eye/hand coordination.

After that we went to Jalapa tacoria, which is a very authentic, owned by two really nice Mexican guys who have been running it for many years and know my friend well since he used to go there with friends every week. It was great seeing them again and talking. They make the best burritos in the state! They are huge - like 3" by 9" long. Pretty massive and stuffed with all fresh ingrediants. I just got veggie with cheese, rice, beans, extra sour cream, guac and salsa. They have a pretty good menu to choose from and the food is just excellant. I can just barely eat half, which I did but I'm happy to have yummy leftovers for lunch tommorrow :) Yummy yummy! I love food! So good day overall, got to relax and work more on my jewelry. Think I'm all ready for the show now.

Of course I'll be much calmer the day of the show, after I get all set up and am sitting down waiting to greet people browsing. I'm really looking forward to my first show.

Link to my Chronic Pain Support Group

2007-08-20T11:31:00.000-07:00

For those who weren't aware, it's almost been a year since I started my own chronic pain support group on yahoo groups. It's been pretty sucessful so far and we regularly meet once a week with another woman who is in Berkeley, at the Alta Bates hospital for once a month meetings. This Tuesday is that meeting so I'm looking forward to seeing if there are any new poeple who will decide to show up from my group. I have 23 active members, the number dropped since I changed some of the rules around, like how you have to post at least once a month - no lurkers allowed! Had some problems with people flaming others and posting paranoid, incorrrect info a few months ago so I changed my policies. And someone also contacted several members of the group off-group asking for medications. He asked me too, which was a big no no and I banned him from the group!

Anyway, it's a great group and if you suffer from ANY sort of chronic pain illness or syndrome, even bad headaches, you're more than welcome to join. The more the merrier! I have tons of resources available: links, help finding doctors in the bay area, free samples that I get from various companies that I'm working with, plus tons of other benefits.

The link is: http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/SFBayAreaFMSMPS/

Check it out and let me know what you think! Have a great day :)

Whitney

What happens if you Google my name in Images?

2007-08-19T21:12:00.000-07:00

So I was curious to see what would come up if I searched for my own name in Google Images. Well the result is very interesting. There are more females out in the world with my full name than I thought there would be. So far in my lifetime, I've only met two other Whitney's and I'm happy to say that I love my name and I'm very glad that my parent's gave me a unique name too.

As for the results, here are some other Whitney Walkers:

This chick from some university on the other side of the country: www.bowdoin.edu/.../whitney_walker_05.shtml

This girl who also rides horses but shows in Western - cute horse! www.countrypleasurefarms.com/Images/Sonny/m14.jpg

I swear to Mother Nature that I did NOT!!!! write this book! Thought you'd get a kick out of this one anyway - www.amazon.com/Baby-Shower-Musts/lm/30TJNTN2AMDVY

My apparently famous caving picture is on this page, just scroll down to read my blurb: animalwelfare.meetup.com/.../ca/san_francisco/

SWEET!!! There's a gun named after me, how cool is that!! The Whitneyville Walker Colt Pistol. http://americanhistory.si.edu/westpoint/history_2.html#

There is a Walker Whitney Plaza in St Petersburg, Florida. I'll have to go someday: http://www.florida-beach-condos.net/stpetersburg-beach-condos.html

I think that I should own this company - this is the Walker-Whitney style of living: http://walkerwhitney.com/index2.html

Heh, I could go on and on but I won't :) I definetly have to in this lifetime visit my museum in New York and climb my mountain :)

Weekend fun

2007-08-19T20:40:00.001-07:00

So this weekend seemed longer than others have. I have no idea why. Sat I did some cleaning up around the house, since I have a friend coming here to stay with me for 3 nights. Then I headed up to Napa to see B. We went to Chevy's for dinner, since I've been missing it so much. I still don't really understand why they closed the one in Alameda. It was the first one ever to be in the Bay Area, and now it's gone. I even drove by the building the other day and it's just sitting there, empty. wtf?

Today plans changed around a bit so I decided to head towards Stinson Beach since it was still pretty early in the day and I haven't been to the beach in quite a while. Had a pretty drive along Hwy 37 until I hit 101 and then there were some traffic areas, like going through San Rafael. I considered calling my cousin Gen to see if she and Chris were around but then later I was too tired and really hurting so I decided not to. Maybe next time! Was almost to Stinson, people going WAY too slow down that hill (have a rant about that on the way back up the hill!), and decided to go to Muir Beach instead of Stinson. I thought that Stinson would probably be overcrowded, which I hate and I think they charge you to park, and I didn't want to pay anything to park. So I ended up at Muir Beach, which was pretty and overcrowded as well, very rocky, lacking tidepools which I was hoping for and it had bees, which kept following me around and making me nervous, so I had to keep walking around rather than sit on a rock like I had planned. It was sorta foggy yet sunny, not windy - sorta weird weather. Not hot but not cold. I thought it was going to be chilly because of the fog. So I took lots of good pictures, which I included here.

After the beach I headed back up the hill, towards the Golden Gate Bridge. Decided since I hadn't been there in a while either that today might be a good day to go. So this guy in front of me in some Impala POS is going under 20mph UPHILL!!!! and is still braking. Gees! I was fuming to say the least. Too windy of a road to pass and it would be really unsafe anyway. But I thought, if I could only get into that car, sit in the passenger seat and have the car controls on my side too, like they do in those cars that teach you how to drive, so that I could push on the gas and teach the idiot how to drive properly!! In my dreams, I know :)

So I was totally wrong about doing the GG on a Sunday. Everyone and their kids were there and I was not happy. But then I had to pee so I didn't have a choice but to stop. Found a parking spot relatively easy (thanks to my placard) and waited in the bathroom line. This little woman behind me, not only did she have the worst BO in the world but she could not respect my personal bubble. If you are not closely related to me, or are a close friend or significant other, do NOT dare stand in my personal space. It's the easiest way to piss me off. I swear, I wanted to step on her toes and run her over. She kept bumping into me, she wasn't even looking at whcih was the line was headed and she was blocking the exit path too. Totally rude, people like that should be extinguised. It was Asian town at the bridge, so I took some cool shots and got the hell out of there as fast as I could! But I did get some good shots, even one where when I was first driving across the bridge, I just stuck the camera out the side window, pointed it up at the span and shot a picture. Came out pretty cool too!

On the way out of the city, instead of stopping and getting my favorite cookies, since I knew the place would be closed, I instead headed over to the Cheesecake Factory to treat myself to a slice of cheesecake, to bring home and devour all by myself. Well I don't normally drive in the city, I try to really avoid it at all costs. I almost didn't make it to get dessert. What is up with the no left turns and one ways?? Actually it's the no left turns that get me worse. Just put in a fricken left turn arrow signal. I'm sure the city can afford to do that too. Certainly would put me out of my misery. It took about 30 min just to get 10 blocks, where I ended up below mission, on Howard, and I needed to be up above Market, on Geary. Took fucking forever. ARGH! Talk about driving me insane. And I guess I haven't been into the city, like downtown, in a while. Well it certainly is tourist season there. Gees! Way too many sheep people. Fortunately I got in and out of the Cheesecake Factory in less than 20 min and I was able to park right in front as well. yay! So that made me happy. I need a little treat now and then.

Got home safe and sound with a kitty who was really really happy to see me. I'm very tired and in a lot of pain. I think I'm starting to stress about my art show next Sunday. I still need to make a couple more necklaces and a bunch more bracelets AND figure out how to display everything. I'm going to let my friend help me with all of that this week since mom and dad won't be home until Friday afternoon and that gives me Friday eve and Sat all day to prepare for the show. But I'm excited too, hope to get a lot of really good feedback on my work. :)

What kind of cat am I?

2007-08-19T18:17:00.002-07:00

You scored as Maine Coon, You are a Maine Coon cat. You are very tall and shy. You like sport and you are different from everyone else.

Maine Coon

88%

Persian

70%

Tabby

50%

Turkish Van

48%

Siamese

45%

Burmese

43%

What breed of cat are you?
created with QuizFarm.com

My interest in Illusionists

2007-08-19T18:17:00.001-07:00

So I'm really interested in magick - always have been. I consider myself to be Pagan/Wiccan. Anyway, ever since the movie The Illusionist which was incredible, I've been interested in real-life illusionists. There are a couple in Las Vegas. I'm watching one guy, Criss Angel on A&E right now - just watched him walk on water, across a pool! Kinda mind-blowing. People were swimming under him, so don't give me that crap about it being fake. Anyway, check him out. You can see him on this site: http://www.angelofillusion.net/newbio.html or his videos of some stuff that he does on: http://www.metacafe.com/tags/criss_angel/.

there's another guy I saw on the science channel - Dirk (somebody) - can't remember his last name right now. He's an illusionist as well and he rescues and raises baby tigers and leopards. He's a big animal conservationist and activist and he likes educating the public on how to save endangered cats. I saw an hour on science channel on him and his big cats. He's just amazing as well.

Now I've been able to figure out some tricks that people do but Illusionists are different!

Where I've been so far!

2007-08-19T18:15:00.001-07:00

create your own visited states map

City lights

2007-08-15T18:25:00.000-07:00

So tonight I decided after I met Kelly for coffee that I would drive up the hill, to see if it was clear enough to see the stars and to see the city lights. I tried to take B up the weekend before but it was so incredibly foggy. That always randomly happens to me now. I plan to go up and it's fog city, sometimes to the point where I can't drive faster than 3 mph because I can hardly see the road - thank god for road lines! And reflective paint too!! :)

So I got up on grizzly peak and there were quite a lot of people up there. Most of the turn off spaces were filled up and I really didn't feel like being near anyone else but I didn't really have any choice by that time. So Parked away from other cars and pulled into a turnout. Turned off the car and stepped out, almost tripped and fell down the hill, which I'm sure would have ended badly. But it was very clear and beautiful. The sky was dark and I saw a shooting star, probably not the end of the already finished meteor shower that I yet again missed. But I did find that Gold Club Rd which runs off of Grizzly Peak does go down the backside of the hill, into nothingness, meaning: no lights, houses, etc for a while so in other words: dark skies! good telescope viewing spot. Will save it for next time. Wish it was easier to get out of the city though. I get really sick of the light pollution.

Took a couple of shots, but only this one came out the best.

Big fire in Alameda

2007-07-26T17:23:00.000-07:00

Sat the 14th there was a massive fire at an old warehouse down on Blanding which is right on the estuary, in Alameda, about a block north of park st. I was getting gas and happened to look up into the sky to see a huge plume of black smoke and I thought, that must be in Alameda. So I drove east and parked on blanding near the football field where the Alameda High team practice. I was fortunate to get there very early before the crowds showed up and they asked everyone to move away from the building. There were 6 engines there, two from Oakland came over even! It was pretty exciting and I got some amazing photos of the firefighters up on the ladder with the hoses and of the fire itself. Pretty amazing and exciting, to be right there. Wish I could be a firefighter right now.

Sat 7th Beach Party

2007-07-26T17:11:00.000-07:00

On Saturday the 7th, I was invited to an awesome beach party at Ocean Beach in Daly City by my friend and favorite local dj, Dr Spook. I think I have 4 of his albums now too :) He is one of the friendliest, sweetest guys I know. I went with a new friend and we met where we parked. I didn't feel like getting lost trying to find where it was located alone so I was glad to have a buddy along. The directions were somewhat like turn left at the large boulder, right at the chain link fence and take the 10th trail before you get to the stables. Needless to say we did get lost but shortly after heard someone whistling - fortunately Spook had located us in a field on the wrong trail. We were glad to see another human being and helped carry all the equipment down to the spot where the party would be. It was neat to see it all get set up. Normally I get to something and the party has already started. There was a big bonfire at one end, whcih most people sat around since it was very cold and windy. I was glad I decided to wear my long underwear under my pants. I danced my butt off, literally - I couldn't walk the next day but it was well worth it. I stayed until 4:30am, the longest I've ever stayed at a party in a long time! But it was amazing and so much fun. Took lots of pics of people spinning fire and Spook spinning too.

Fire Arts Festival

2007-07-26T17:05:00.000-07:00

I went to the Fire Arts Festival on Thursday July 12th with a friend. It was just amazing. Fire, fire everywhere. 8-10pm was the time where we got to walk around and look at all of the displays. 10-12am was their version of the Odyssee, called the Fire Odysey (i cannot spell!). It was just amazing - sculptures on fire, moving objects, machines that sent balls of fire blazing into the sky, loud kabooms and such. Many different interactive art type sculptures that also moved and were of course on fire as well. The play was amazing! I couldn't take any pics during the play but it was just amazing! I got to see the Crucible's Tesla coil so I am happy :) I am just fascinated by Tesla. I will definetly go back next year and hopefully plan to volunteer too! Below are some pics I got of it all :) It was pyromaniac heaven!!

Brother visit

2007-07-25T19:29:00.001-07:00

So my brother came home for what was supposed to be a surprise visit this last Sunday for my mom's birthday which was Saturday. Sunday we went to my Aunt Tish and soon-to-be Uncle Tim's house in Lafayette for dinner fun with Uncle tommie, amanda, aunt vickie and my cousins. Lots of fun. Went swimming, wrestled with my brother, had a cannonball contest and tried my hand at jumping off the diving board while throwing the basketball towards the hoop. Never quite made it but got to practice my hand at shooting a basket again. Lots of fun. Swallowed a lot of pool water!!! But that's what you get when you're annoying and much bigger brother keeps dunking your head into the pool! Needless to say I'm very tired and feel like I'm flaring still but had a blast and would never not do someting like that just because I'm in pain.

My brother drove up in his new Z4 for which he took me on a very thrilling (or scary in my mom's opinion) drive up Skyline Blvd, both ways on Grizzly Peak Blvd and then back along Skyline to the end where it dumps you onto Joaquin Miller. I think at a couple places we were going over 100mph and maybe 60-80 on some of the corners. Fucking awesome ride! Got to see the beautiful city skyline as well :) Took a few pictures but was mainly focused on sitting on my phone as well as his which in the beginnng went flying out of the center console to my feet so I had to hold onto it. He claims he had never done that beofre but whatever. I know he drives like that whenevr he can. Below is his car :)

Yesterday we went out to the Livermore valley and went wine tasting and also did a picnic. Went to Retzlaff, which I had been to before with Kelly and my parents and brother really enjoyed it as well! We were the only ones there so that is always nice. And of course the port was most excellant and I forgot again to ask where they buy their chocolate that they serve with it. I think I ate more than 10 pieces. Oh well! Then we went to Conncannon which was down the road a ways and that was nice too, though neither had a Zin which bummed me out and I didnt' much like anything at the second one except their petite syrah was okay, better than others I've tasted. It was very windy and about 85 degrees out there. And I became designated driver on the way back as usual.

Jon left yesterday evening, sped off in his Z4 down the street blasting a new refurbished edition of E.L.O. time. It was pretty great. And hopefully we'll see him in Tahoe in August and also defiently Sept 15th weekend in Tahoe when my cousin Kitty is getting married there. Lots of fun!

My relationship personality type

2007-07-25T19:14:00.000-07:00

The Priss
Deliberate Brutal Love Dreamer (DBLD)

Mature. Responsible. Aristocratic. Excuse me. The Priss.

Prisses are the smartest of all female types. You're highly perceptive, and confident in your judgements. You'd take brutal honesty over superficiality any time--your friends always know where they stand with you. You're completely unfake. Don't tell me that's not a word. You're also excellent at redirecting internal negative energy.

These facts indicate people are often intimidated by you. They also fall for you, hard. You have a distant, composed allure that many find irresistible. If only more of them lived up to your standards.

Your exact female opposite:
The Playstation

Random Gentle Sex Master

You were probably the last among your friends to have sex. And the first to pretend that you're pregnant. LOL. Though you're inclined to use sex as weapon, at least it's not as one of mass destruction. You're choosier than most about your partners. A supportive relationship is what you're really after. Whether you know it or not, you need something steady & long-term. And soothing.

ALWAYS AVOID: The Playboy (RGSM), The Loverboy (RGLM)

CONSIDER: The Manchild (RBLD)

Link: The Online Dating Persona Test @ OkCupid - free online dating.
My profile name: : cavegirl1

Dressage perfection!

2007-06-29T02:13:00.000-07:00

Sample video from the Equestrian World Games earlier this year. This is literally dressage at it's greatest. Notice how the horse is moving to the music and you can barely tell how the rider is communicating to the horse what to do and the horses' legs are almost always in sync. Pretty fricken cool!

http://beboframe.com/FlashFrame.jsp?Size=S&FlashBoxId=3309347442

Multimedia message

2007-06-28T19:32:00.001-07:00

My fun afternoon!

2007-06-28T17:51:00.000-07:00

So something pretty funny happened to me today when I went over to Bay Farm island to walk Goldie, the dog that I normally walk 3 times a week. Usually I walk her M-W but since I was in Oreogn and got back yesterday, I'm walking her this week th and fri instead. Anyway, we went outside and I needed to get some bags out of my car and my breakfast and as I opened the back door, she hopped right onto the back seat, laid down and proceeded to refuse to come out again. I thought, that's interesting. I said to her "so, does this mean you don't want to walk around her, you want to go someplace new?" She didn't respond but looked content so off we went. There is a beautiful walkway along the water in the Harbor Bay Parkway. You can watch the planes take off, the wind blows in from the fog from across the bay and you can see the city too! So we went over there, parked along the street and got out. Goldie was suddenly a completely different dog! She was happy and prancing along, pulling at the leash in excitement. She kept putting her nose up into the wind and smiling - it was very cute! So we walked there today instead of in her neighborhood. I think she's alot like me, in that, she gets bored with routines and prefers a change of scenery when she can have the opportunity. I let her chase the gophers and we walked out by the rocks. I found a fisher's net - the kind on a long pole, in perfect condition. I think I'll try to sell it on Criagslist :) So we had a lot of fun and when we got back, I told her mom what we did and she was delighted and said I coudl take her someplace by car whenever I wnated to. So this will be great. I'm much more apt to go walk for exercise if I can be someplace beautiful. So that was a lot of fun and she was very tired when we got back, which makes for a happy dog owner :)

Very Sad Day!

2007-01-29T18:22:00.000-08:00

Very sad day ;(
Barbaro had to be put down today. FOr those who don't know about him, he won the Kentucky Derby last year by many lengths. He was going to be the next Triple Crown winner (when you win all 3 races) but he was injured badly at the Preakness (#2 race). He pulled through with strength and a will to live. Jane Smiley puts it the best:

Born to Run
For a Horse Like Barbaro, the Spirit Is in the Race

By Jane Smiley
Special to the Washingon Post
Monday, January 29, 2007; 4:10 PM

Nine years ago, I had a thoroughbred mare who came down with colic in the night, and was too far gone to save by the time she was found at 6 a.m. After she was euthanized, I remember staring at her body, which was stretched out in the grass, running my hands over her. Her coat was shining. Her haunch was rounded and firm. Her feet and legs were perfect. Only that one thing had been wrong, that twist in her gut, but it was enough, and it killed her. So it is with all horses.

They are engineered so close to the margins of what is physically possible that when one thing fails, it can cause the failure of the whole animal.

So it is, especially, perhaps, with Barbaro. When we've seen his pictures over the last months, his ears are up, he's attentive and beautiful and interested. He looks pretty good, except for those casts.

His vets warned us all along that the odds were against him, but we didn't really believe them. They had hope, too. How could a horse who appeared so full of life break his leg and be so suddenly close to death? His head was fine. His back was fine. His lungs and heart and chest were fine. In fact, after a while, his broken leg was fairly fine. It was the other leg that was so worrisome, since the weight of his body constantly bearing down on the delicate structures inside his foot eventually damaged and destroyed them.

A horse's hoof is wondrous structure -- the outside horn is lined with delicate membranes and blood vessels that feed and support the bones of the foot. The bones of the foot are analogous to a person's finger tips, since a horse's knee is analogous to a person's wrist -- the race horse carries a thousand pounds at thirty-five or forty miles per hour using a few slender bones supported by an apparatus of ligaments and tendons that have no analogues in human anatomy. Every part of the system depends on every other part. What happened to Barbaro was that the engineering couldn't take it. When it was right, as in the Kentucky Derby, it was perfectly right, and when it became wrong, it became irredeemably wrong.

Some observers have been angered by the outpouring of sympathy toward Barbaro, but there is something extra large about the death of a horse.

And the death of a thoroughbred seems to me to be even more shocking, because thoroughbreds have been bred to press on and prevail where other breeds of horses throw in the towel. When we saw Barbaro in last May's Kentucky Derby fly away from the field so gracefully and effortlessly, he was doing something thoroughbreds have been bred to do for three hundred years -- to sense the encroaching fatigue of three-quarters of a mile at top speed and want only to run faster, to push ahead and take the lead.

We say that thoroughbreds have "blood," meaning the DNA of desert Arab horses, and "heart," meaning fortitude, desire, and competitive spirit.

It was heart that we saw in Barbaro, not only on Derby Day, but also on Preakness Day, when he stood injured in the middle of the track, touching his toe to the ground and snatching it up again, somehow impatient, somehow not truly aware of the pain, somehow still ready to get going.

I watched the Preakness with some lifelong racing people. When Barbaro got injured, we turned the TV off. All of us had seen it before; everyone who loves racing has seen it all too many times. It is the paradox of racing. His dynamic beauty and his exceptional heart were gifts Barbaro inherited from his racing forebears, who had the luck and toughness to run and win and prove themselves worthy of reproducing.

And then, during his medical saga, he showed that he was intelligent, too. According to a friend of mine who talked to Michael Matz in the summer, Barbaro knew when he needed some pain relief -- he would stand by the sling and shake it until they put him in it, and when he was tired of it, he would shake himself so that it rattled, signalling he was ready to be taken out. And then he would go to his stall and lie down.

Did he want to survive? It seemed as though he did.

In a great race horse, the heart and mind do the running, and the body tries to hold up.

Yes, to those who don't care about horses, terrible things are happening all over the world these days, and they demand from many people an unprecedented level of endurance, but we horse-lovers say, this, too? That this beautiful and innocent animal should also die?

When I think of Barbaro, I like to think also of some of the tough ones -- John Henry, Seabiscuit, a horse I bred a mare to once, named Loyal Pal. Among the three of them, they ran hundreds of times. They managed to avoid the bad steps and the bad luck, to go to the races as if a race were a trot in the park, coming back afterward to a bucket of grain and a long nap. Sometimes, thousands of fans thrilled to their exploits. Sometimes, the only ones watching were the owner, the trainer, and a few punters. Like Barbaro, they did it because they were born and bred to do it, because a thoroughbred loves to run, and because they didn't know what it meant not to keep on trying.

Jane Smiley is the author of "Horse Heaven," "A Year at the Races," and the forthcoming "Ten Days in the Hills."

If anyone would like to send their sympathies to the owners and trainer, you can contact them at this link: From USEF:

Dear Equestrian Community,
We know there are hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions, of you out there who would like to send words of support to Barbaro and trainer Michael Matz. A special email account here at the USEF has been created for that purpose. The messages will be compiled and sent to Barbaro, Michael and owners Roy and Gretchen Jackson at the New Bolton clinic.

The email address is matzbarbaro@usef.org.

A very sad day. Well I have his model the Breyer made. They were able to raise over $114,000 to help pay the costs of Barbaro's surgeries. Wow! I was so hopeful that he would make it and now I'm very sad.