3377 Even I was shocked by this

Recently, someone left a comment at one of my critiques of the direction of public libraries saying I wasn't a very good researcher [i.e. what liberals and humanists say when you don't cite their favorite pundits or sources]. But Tomeboy always digs deep and finds things I wouldn't even notice--like his analysis of the American Library Association's bibliography on homeschooling. I've been critical of ALA (I've never been a member), but even I was shocked. It's a fine report as always, Mr. Tomeboy.

In 2002 Midwinter in New Orleans, ALA's Association for Library Service for Children voted to establish a Home School Task Force to;

...investigate what action or activities, if any, ALSC needs to take to meet the needs of children's librarians serving home-schooled children and their families....

The product of this resolution? An exhaustive bibliography comprising of one internet resource, two books and two articles. The latter four published in the last century. Need I mention the breadth and timeliness of ALA's Task Force on the Environment page?

A middle school student probably couldn't get away with this! I'm almost afraid to check the Environment bibliography. I've seen homeschooling reports and resources at my public library, although for its size and focus on other topics (movies, cookbooks and scrapbooking) probably not as good as it could be based on local interest. Although this might explain why my PL's science fair reference shelf for children is so out of date (by 20-25 years in some cases).

Tomeboy speculates on why ALA would do such a poor job for an important topic. Might it be that about 70% of homeschoolers are evangelical Christians and ALA is hostile to religion?

homeschooling
libraries
bibliographies
American Library Association

3376 Looks like a crouching cat

This is a screen capture of my statistics for the past year for Collecting My Thoughts. Sort of looks like a crouching or sleeping cat outline. See the perky ears on the left, then the rounded back on the right. Oh, you don't see it? Well, I also like to paint when I'm not blogging, and am working on a poetry assignment which is much tougher than either painting or blogging. This week we're supposed to use a line from someone else's poem (at the Poetry Thursday site) and work with that.


I've been blogging since October 2003 and have written about 4,220 entries at this login (8 blogs), and about 30 at another blogger account (2), and about 450 at my LIS journal/weblog. I'm so over-blogged that blogger.com hasn't been able to move me to beta blogger. I've deleted perhaps 50 or so entries that after they were up for a bit, I didn't like. However, I don't know if they ever go away or are floating out there trying to connect. I changed the name of one of my blogs after it was up for about 3 months--that's a mess, try not to do that. I've blogged about what I blog about. I'm nearing 140,000 hits/visits to this site. I don't have site meters at all my blogs--and some I rarely look at. My Family Tree Maker stopped me in mid-19th century relative yesterday to tell me that I'd just hit 3400 entries in that. So I stopped and googled a 3rd cousin once removed and found she is a lawyer in DC who has argued cases before the Supreme Court. Don't we live in amazing times for information and communication?

Prayer Request

Not much blogging today. This is a photo of my brother's grandson and his daddy, who has been injured. About 10 days ago he was working on the ranch he manages in northern Illinois and got a small thorn in his palm, but being a hard worker continued with his chores. The hand became inflamed, and then dark streaks were running up his arm, so it was off to ER. He's had a week in the hospital with powerful antibiotics, but whatever pathogen is attacking him, they haven't been able to identify it or stop it completely. He's home now with my niece doing the IV drip and he daily goes back to have the open wound repacked.

But the nightmare continued.

While he was still hospitalized, some of the horses got out. Most stayed near the barn but two went out to the road where they were hit by a car with three people, all seriously injured about 4:30 in the morning. One horse, the ranch owner's, was killed on impact, and the other, my niece's horse, had to be put down from his serious injuries. She cradled its head and said good-bye. Tears are running down my cheeks as I think about her then rushing off to the hospital to tell her ill husband before he saw it on the news.

Please pray for my family and the injured family from Leaf River.

3374 How much does it cost?

to support a single adult who isn't going to college?

There was another scare story in USA Today last week about rising costs of college.

"For academic year 2006-07, the average cost of tuition, room and board at a public university was $12,796; for a private school, the total averaged $30,367."

Just two years ago the same paper reported the good news that rising costs were making more students eligible for government aid!

So, let's take the college experience out of the equation. How much does it cost you in real 2007 dollars if your young adult didn't go to college but you were shelling out for the apartment, utilities, transportation and parking, food, clothes, leisure activities, cable, computer, broad band, and insurance?

3373 Americans and health care

Something to consider when thinking about demands for government health care. This writer takes a slightly different direction.

"There’s ample evidence that Americans don’t care very much about their health. They grouse about copayments at the doctor’s office or pharmacy and may leave an office in high dudgeon if expected to pay a reasonable bill not "covered" by their insurance. They often refuse to buy medical insurance even if they can afford it. Aside from a subpopulation of health fanatics, many Americans constantly defy the grandmotherly advice* that is the proven basis for effective health maintenance. They smoke, drink, take drugs, engage in casual sex, and/or overeat. They do not exercise, eat their vegetables, or conscientiously wash their hands. They may be willing to take lots of pills, but appear to be allergic to anything that interferes with instant gratification or requires self-discipline."

*Like mine at this blog, which is--eat less, move more; eat all the colors; don't smoke.

from Your money and your life.

Monday Memories--What Shirley told Ann

It's hard for me to resist a used book sale at the public library, a used book store like the fabulous Acorn down on Fifth Avenue in Grandview, or a box of giveaways at the church library (picked up 4 after church yesterday). About a month ago I was paging through a $1.00 hard cover book at the Friends of the Library book sale that had the slight odor of basement storage. I don't recall the title, but it was an early 20th century imprint, nearly 100 years old. A fragile, yellowed 4" x 5" note from Shirley to Ann fell out. The handwriting reminded me of my grandfather's when he used pencil, although he had a beautiful calligraphic style when using pen. There were no misspelled words; the apostrophes, commas and hyphens were all correctly placed. I know I've heard this before--maybe in a sermon--or read it on the internet. But here's what Shirley told Ann.

Ann--Did you know about the minister that told a certain man that if he didn't stop flirting with another man's wife, he would tell who he was to the whole congregation.

The next Sunday he told the congregation that the man whom he mentioned should put a $5 bill in the collection and he wouldn't tell. Well, they took up the collection and found 15 $5 bills and two ones with a note attached that said he would pay the rest pay day.

Shirley

View More Monday Memories Participants
My visitors and those I'll visit this week are:Anna, Becki, Chelle, Chelle Y., Cozy Reader, Debbie, Friday's Child, Gracey, Irish Church Lady, Janene, Janene in Ohio, Jen, Katia, Lady Bug, Lazy Daisy, Ma, Mrs. Lifecruiser, Melli, Michelle, Paul, Susan, Viamarie.

The nice men in the ambulance

Can you imagine her horror as she listens to her voice mail from her aged mother who tells her she had a fall, but the nice men in the ambulance have transported her, and then doesn't say where? This nurse practitioner brings you into the story of eldercare. . . a public health nurse, a family nurse practitioner, and an academic who taught family and community theory but learned she was completely unprepared to be a caregiver.

"I finally located her and was told that no information could be given as she had not yet signed a Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) form. This was the first of many frustrations with our healthcare system. I finally succeeded in reaching a nurse at that hospital who was known by a member of our family. She told me that radiology studies revealed a right hip fracture and 2 pelvic fractures: thus began our family's journey through the intricate web known as elder care in America, a journey with many peaks and valleys, and one that resulted in the reshaping of our family structure in ways I could never have foreseen."

And 5 months down the road and through the thicket of various mishaps,

"When discharge time came, there was no placement planned, and I found mother fully dressed and waiting for me with the IV still running. There were no wheelchairs available for transport, no person available to get her to the car, and no paperwork completed. I found a wheelchair and transported her myself. We made quite a picture -- mother in her wheelchair holding on to her overnight case and purse with me pushing from behind with her walker over one shoulder and my briefcase and purse over the other. Not one person offered to help us as we made our way to the hospital lobby."

She gives some rather gloomy statistics and predictions, given the age of the baby boomer generation. However, one thing bothered me a bit--although not as bad as the article I posted about the clueless doctor and his mother in December, this nurse puts her own patients above her mother's care at a critical time. She also had access to an amazing array of top notch services, yet says there needs to be more. Would a waitress or school teacher put her job ahead of her mother? But I digress. It is a very moving article and her mother is truly amazing, but if you have a frail or elderly parent, YOU NEED TO READ THIS, just to be prepared.

"The Cycle of Relocation: One Family's Experience With Elder Care" story at Medscape.com [free site, but may require registration--it's rather lengthy, so click on printer version even if you don't print, which will make scrolling much easier

eldercare

3370 Let's rethink baning DDT

It's not really worth killing all these people, is it? For you folks counting bodies in Iraq, I remind you that these mothers and children are just as dead.

Q. How many acute attacks of malaria are there each year?

A. There are up to 500 million estimated attacks of malaria and 1 million deaths due to malaria each year.

Science Trivia from Scientific American.

3369 Boxer's no champion for women

A commenter and story reported over at Amy's blog wrote:

"OK, Rice has no children serving in the military because she has no children. But Boxer also mentioned she has neither children nor grandchildren in the military. Therefore, why the hell does she get to serve Foreign Relations?"

Another news maven called Boxer's comment a giant step backward for feminists. It's the Kerry foot-in-mouth, garden variety, Democrat, double standard.

3368 The public library as lyceum

In the 19th century, before the era of a tax supported, public library there were lyceums--public lectures, concerts and entertainment. The content of the speeches and debates were often then republished in the local papers. When I was doing research on the writing of 19th century women in agricultural publications, it was interesting to follow their activities on the lyceum circuit. Then came the Chautauqua movement--both the permanent that still exist in places like Lakeside, OH, Bay View, MI, and Chautauqua, NY, and the traveling ones which used to stop for a week or so in towns as small as Franklin Grove, IL and perform plays, operas, and provide political debates. The Chautauqua movement also published material and offered home study courses, and award certificates of completion. The largest continuing education movement in the United States was provided by the federal government through agricultural and home extension.

Although towns had libraries as our population moved westward, they were private, usually maintained and paid for by the local women's clubs, which also offered their members educational events, debates, and social gatherings. Some cities had benevolent book collecting patrons who made their learning available to the general public, but they weren't "public libraries" as we know them. When my parents were children they lived on farms in two different counties, both close to Dixon, IL. People who lived outside Dixon could pay a fee and use the library. It is still that way in many townships today that don't have libraries. One of the wealthiest communities in Arizona has no library--they pay a fee to use the one in the next suburb because it is much cheaper that way and doesn't bring outsiders into their gated communities. It is pay-to-play because you aren't within the taxing district.

The public library I used as a child was established about 1931--my mother's library card was #14 because she was a college student in that town at the time. I worked there when I was in high school, and hung out there with my friends in elementary school because there was no place else to go.

My knowledge of the time line is fuzzy here (I didn't have a course in library history), but in the 20th century public libraries decided to revisit the lyceum concept so popular in the 19th century. (Some also provide day care for after school children and circulate garden tools and paintings and sculpture for your home--a bit far afield even for the lyceum concept.) Today's public librarians see themselves as educators and social workers on a mission to improve the lives of their patrons instead of "just" adjuncts to the educational system. I think this is wasteful overlap. Here's what I posted at a library discussion today:

"Those of you who work in public libraries think I don't understand the educational mission of the public library. Actually, I do. I just don't agree with it. Calling me uninformed or anti-library won't change my mind. I'm a big user and fan of my local public library, but I also depend on Ohiolink because much of my taste and research go beyond what is available, such as my pick-up yesterday from Ashland University, I don't have enough faith to be an atheist by Norman L. Geisler. It really belongs in our PL, but I'm so tired of fighting with them over their selection policies I just drive over to OSU and pick up my religious and political titles there. You wonder why you lose readers to Amazon or Barnes and Noble? My library's web site doesn't even have a slot to plug in a suggestion for purchase. But I digress.

Instead of teaching library patrons how to cook, quilt, dance, play guitar and scrapbook, I am a strong believer in libraries offering bibliographic instruction and user education both by genre, topic and format, be it digital or paper. I think libraries should teach about preservation, copyright, business sources and investment tools, how to find complex sources locally and statewide, tracking down local history sources, and assist the community businesses, churches, foundations and schools in developing their own archives. I think the meeting rooms in the building should be available to community groups who may or may not be using library materials.

I think there should be more staff (friendly and outgoing) on the floor to help patrons maneuver the increasingly complex on-line catalog and purchased packages from suppliers who know digitizing but diddly about how people learn and remember. Waiting for patrons to come to a desk of scowling or chatting staff just doesn't cut it in my book. I think library staff should be encouraged to go out into the community and give presentations, I think they should write book reviews for the local papers, and organize reading groups. I think they should ask the public if they are doing their job and what parts of the collection are not meeting community standards.

As I've said many times, if libraries don't do their job, who will?"

3367 Do you start your meetings on time?

The thought occurred to me this week I have probably wasted a month of my life waiting for meetings to start. If the meeting is at 10 a.m., I'm usually there at 9:55, hanging up my coat, picking out a chair, opening my notebook and settling in. Around 10:10, the chair says something like, "Well, we'll just wait another minute or two." I look around at the other 7 or 8 and think, "Don't we count?" One by one, the stragglers wander in, bustling, hustling and whispering. Finally, about 10:20, we're on our way.

YOU can put a stop to this by just starting on time. Enabling procrastinators does not cure them. They will be late the next time, too. Changing the start time to 10:15 just means they will arrive at 10:30. Changing the day won't work either. They will have as many conflicts for Tuesday as they had for Wednesday.

Starting on time may not change them either, but isn't it worth a try?

time management
meetings
procrastination

3366 Investing in real estate

David Crook who writes for the Wall Street Journal has a new book, Wall Street Journal Complete Real Estate Investing Guide Book, which came out in December. The WSJ has its own convoluted system on when to insert a hyphen, but I'm not playing along. Anyway, he had an article in the WSJ on Jan. 10 that really knocked my socks off (can't stop using cliches since it was the assignment for Poetry Thursday).

Using two columns to illustrate hypothetical investments in two houses both costing $200,000 in 1990 with a $160,000 mortgage, identical improvements (kitchen remodeling, new roof, and $150,000 addition) and both refinanced 3 times to lower rates, and both sold for $650,000 in 2006, he shows column one with a loss of $86,424 and column two with a gain of $403,397. Column one was the owner-occupied home with the usual deductions and expenses, and column two was a rental with the usual deductions, expenses and income.

It was eye opening to see that the fabulous gains people think they make on their homes probably aren't. Even if you play the devil's advocate and deduct what the owner of the rental would pay in rent for a place to live for 15 years while he rented out his own property, column 2 house is still ahead.

I don't know if this particular example is in the book, or if Crook wrote it specifically for the paper, but his writing is clear and well paced. This would be a good title to recommend to your library.

3365 What puzzles me about libraries

Keep in mind that I was never trained to be a librarian in a public library (there are four types--academic, public, government and private/special/business). I didn't receive the official indoctrination, and never joined the American Library Association. However, I use the library maybe twice a week, and get great benefit from it.

What I've never understood in all my years of using a public library is why they are adjunct lyceums, chautauquas, amusement parks and community centers for meetings. It's not like our community has no outlet or opportunity for activities. Our suburb (and others in the Columbus area) has a "Life Long Learning" program, tax supported through the city, and federal grants, I believe. These classes meet in a variety of community buildings from churches, to fraternal halls and public schools. You can take accounting, furniture refinishing or Swahili--there's a huge variety. Various universities and colleges in the area also offer continuing education or credit for college courses. The local churches also offer both religious and non-religious programing on everything from politics to art to financial management, plus personal growth classes and lectures on marriage and parenting. The Columbus Museum offers classes as do local environmental and history societies. There are community art groups all over the place--the Worthington Art League, Dublin Community Arts Council, etc. who bring in speakers and programs. The mega-lumber sites like Lowe's and Home Depot offer home maintenance and interior decorating classes. The whole foods stores teach cooking and health classes. The local hospitals and medical networks send out quarterly announcements about their classes on everything from cancer to coping with stress. Every imaginable sport training and league is offered through the community programs, or you can go to a local sports mega-store and climb their indoor mountain. Our senior centers located throughout Columbus offer a wide variety of lectures, how-to-classes, and recreational opportunities.

So why is the public library offering writing classes, or music lectures, or quilting discussions, or this noisy gathering for middle schoolers:

The library “turns it up to 11” as we invite guitar heroes of all ages to join us in our first all-new videogame themed events. Play the Playstation 2 versions of Guitar Heroes 1 and 2 on our giant 12-foot screen as we transform our Theater into a Virtual Rock Venue, complete with sound system and lights. Sign up is limited to 50 and we expect to be “sold out.” We’ll provide snacks and everything needed to play. Feel free to bring in your own custom Guitar Heroes controllers.
UAPL program for winter

There may have been a time long ago--maybe during the Great Depression--when people didn't have much to do in their leisure time. But those days are gone.

I think it is time to privatize the libraries. They've lost their mission and are searching for something to do with their staff and money.

3364 Friday Family Photo

Kleppinger Clippinger Klepinger--that's a family name in my genealogy (maternal side). I wish I had a photo of Anna Maria Klepinger, also called Polly. But Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre didn't invent the daguerreotype process until 1839, 11 years after she was married. I'm guessing it was considered a bit worldly in their conservative religious group, even when it became popular.

Insert here
a photo of
the lovely

Anna Maria, b. 1808, d. 1875
and
her husband
Christian Wenger, b. 1805, d. 1885
on their
wedding day
August 14, 1828

Christian and Polly were successful farmers--owning over 1,000 acres of land near Englwood which is near Dayton, Ohio. However, they started married life with almost nothing. My grandfather's older sister, the woman we called Aunt Allie (Mrs. J. Edwin Jay, later President of Wilmington College) related this tale for the Kleppinger researcher: "It is said that when Christian and his bride came to their new home on horseback and dismounted to enter their cabin, he said, 'Polly, this is all we have.' and showed her the coin. It is said to have been 50 cents."

Christian was a Deacon in the River Brethren (Brethren in Christ) which I think was a split off and mix of Mennonite and Dunker Brethren. They had 12 children, and the one I do have a photo of was Nancy, my grandfather's mother. That's probably where Aunt Allie heard the story of her grandparents' 50 cent start in life.

Although I had Christian and Polly in my database (the Wenger family I've written about before), I was able to find this anecdote by using Heritage Quest Online at my public library. You can search census data, or people, places and books. The book Kleppinger-Clippinger Klepinger family history by Stanley J. Kleppinger (Allentown, PA: George P. Schlicher & Son, 1956) 351 p. with its index had been completely scanned and was easily searchable. The next time you have a question about someone hiding in your family tree, ask your librarian if there are any on-line sources available.

Kleppinger
Klepinger
Wenger
genealogy
Brethren
Brethren in Christ

3363 Send Mom on a cruise

Although my children might tell you otherwise, I'm not one of those high-maintenance mothers. I rarely say, "give me grandchildren," "train your dog better," and "stop smoking" all in the same sentence. Even so, maybe your mom is a bit cloying and needy--dentist appointments, grocery store shopping, and lonesome. Maybe she doesn't drive anymore, her house needs painting, the gutters are full and most of her friends have died or moved away?

You've seen those stories about how luxury cruises are cheaper than nursing homes? It's true--I just noticed a story today in the travel section--and cha-ching, I just couldn't resist thinking about sending good old mom on an extended cruise as an alternative to assisted care.

Now, assisted care isn't a nursing home; it's independent living, usually in a nice apartment but there are people around to serve meals once or twice a day, and help with personal care and entertain even if it is in North Dakota or Kansas. They can play pool, or bridge for hours on end. It can be pricey--maybe $5,500 to $6,000 a month depending on the facility. But you can send mom on the maiden voyage of the Queen Victoria, 106 nights, for $20,304. That's 3.5 months--there will be staff to clean the room (every day), change the linens, 3 fabulous meals a day, entertainment, a nice library, a doctor on call all the time, new friends, exercise facilities, swimming, massage, hair dresser, cable, TV, wireless, and so forth, plus stops in interesting places like Copenhagen or Amsterdam where there will probably be bus tours with a guide just like the ones to the malls in Fargo close to her assisted living unit. Let's see, 3.5 months x $6,000 = $21,000. Wow. The cruise is cheaper! Where do we sign up.

Ooops. Sold out.

cruises
assisted living
retirement
care givers

3362 Any stick will do

when Nancy Pelosi pounds the President. I was looking back through searches for her exact words when she was claiming our troops didn't have enough equipment or boots on the ground to win, but although I found it reported, I think it's been removed from her web page. But scanning the 2003 and 2004 statements (with photos), her plastic surgery is quite evident, anticipating I suppose how much she'd be on camera, and also that she may be the biggest, shrillest shrew ever to hit the fan. I think we can give her credit that we are where we are in Iraq because she certainly has been giving comfort and aid to the enemy. Someone please hand her a history book of the Vietnam War, the one where the Communists praise the American war protestors for giving them hope and courage.

3361 Is it cold somewhere?

It's back to the young 50s in Ohio, but my tips on frozen car doors has had 13 hits today.

3360 Librarians and Nurses, peas in a pod?

The American Library Association has great difficulty minding the store--er--the library. Is it too boring figuring out why Google and Amazon left them in the dust? The ALA spends its time fretting over the Bush administration, poverty, crime, gay and women's rights and war while handing Castro and Chavez a library get-out-of-jail-free card. I guess all the library problems have been solved (except how to get an increasingly non-reading public to use libraries).

Then I was looking something up in a nursing journal, "Journal of Professional Nursing." I think it was something about handwashing and how hospitals and medical staff are infecting people because they've become careless. And I came across this challenge--nurses should prevent war, not just treat war wounded.

"Nurses have a distinguished history of caring for the wounded during wartime without regard to ethnicity, nationality, religion, and other personal factors. Although it is important that this tradition continue, nurses can individually and collectively take a more active posture in preventing war and armed conflict. "Journal of Professional Nursing," Nov-Dec 2006. Now what direction do you suppose that "active posture" will take?

Here's a radical concept. How about if the librarians collect, preserve, promote and dispense information (from all view points, not just their own), and nurses protect and care for our health with the highest proven standards (like hand washing). Then after doing a highly professional job for 8 hours or a shift, they could leave work with a clear conscience to tackle those projects of their own religious and political persuasion.

Poetry Thursday

Indiana claims James Whitcomb Riley as the "Hoosier Poet," and there is a collection of his manuscripts at the Lilly Library at Indiana University. You really only need one poet like Riley to enchant the school children with the rural dialect and old stories, so there probably wasn't much demand for Harry S. Chester, the "Elkhart County Poet," who also enjoyed and wrote poetry in this style. He was the Clerk of Courts, and although I've browsed through the Internet, this poem, "The Wakarusa Band," is the only title I can find. I didn't actually find it on the Internet either--I was doing genealogical research at the public library, and it is in the Elkhart County History. I have few ties to this county, but don't you get a little misty eyed thinking about old Harry behind the desk scratching out the marriage licenses, and tapping his toe while he passed his time writing poetry.

The Wakarusa Band
by Harry S. Chester

You talk about your Brooks's Band and Boyer at his best
An' Thomas's big orchestra, an' Sousa an' the rest
Their hifalutin' music, I suppose, is good enough
For city folks who educate on operatic stuff;
But when you want to reach the heart and make it laugh an' sob,
An' be in touch with nature like, and make it thrill an' throb
With melody an' music that a child can understand,
You ought to hear a concert by the Wakarusa Band.

They ain't up on concertos an' cantatas an' the like
But you can't beat 'em grindin' out a quickstep on the pike
An' when they play "Old Nellie Gray" an' "Where the Daisies Grow,"
My memory goes slidin' back to the long, long ago;
An' music that'll work like that an' strike your very soul,
An' flood you full of memories an' all your past unroll
That kind of music playin' fills its highest mission and
That's why I like to listen to the Wakarusa Band.

I saw the great directors in Chicago at the Fair,
With all their fine musicianers annihilatin' air;
A drum'd bang, a horn'd blat, a clarinet's shriek
An' ef you call that music, say, you ought to hear me speak;
I want the kind of music, that'll melt into the heart
I wouldn't give a picayune for all their classic art;
Let educated critics gulp it down an' call it grand
But I’ll just sit an' listen to the Wakarusa Band.

There are several photos of the Wakarusa Band (not to be confused with the music festival in Kansas) in the archives at the Public Library in Wakarusa, Indiana, here and here.

While I was at my public library, there were some middle school “musicianers annihilatin' air" with bang and blat and shriek.

My Turn
You ramble in your Myspace on why you do that stuff--
Your fuzzy youtube I 'spose is good enuf.
But still I'd rather read your words and text
without that noise ef from you gen-next
which don' melt my heart or strike my soul
as your past and future you unroll.

Poetry Thursday
Wakarusa, Indiana
dialect poetry

3358 What a nice idea

Burning the clocks. A little late for 2006; maybe next year. We've got a creek. . . I could make a lantern.

3357 Are you from Podunk?

For you non-USA'ns, "Podunk" is a synonym for the town from nowhere--too small to matter. Except to the people who live there. I grew up in two lovely Podunks, Forreston and Mt. Morris in Ogle County, Illinois, in the northern part of the state, close enough to Wisconsin and Iowa that we sometimes took Sunday afternoon drives to those states. Here is a website that's lots of fun, called epodunk.com where you can search out information about your little town. There are also Podunk sites for Canada and Ireland.

It appears to me now in 2007 that Forreston is the more attractive of the two, but when I was living there (1946-1951), Mt. Morris was twice the size and had the better business district, nicer homes, paved streets and more advanced schools. In those days Mt. Morris had a thriving publishing and magazine distribution industry--actually they are still there--but experienced a devastating strike in the 1970s, and the town has been slipping since. Even today, many libraries have subscriptions addressed to Mt. Morris. Statistically, the 2000 census still shows Mt. Morris with the higher median income and home values, but it essentially no longer has a school system, which really gutted the town of community spirit. Meanwhile, Forreston has diversified with small businesses, rallied its voters for bond issues, made itself a wonderful place to buy real estate and settle down, and has moved on. Both towns have housing stock with median range far below the national average.

The funny little picture on the Mt. Morris epodunk site is actually a post card of Pine Creek, IL where my dad grew up. It is closer to Dixon (home of Pres. Reagan) than Mt. Morris. Not sure how they select the graphics.

3356 Are you a tea drinker?

Although I’m not particularly fond of tea, I do drink it first thing in the morning because I am awake about an hour before the coffee shops open.* I thought this study of the affects of milk on the vasodilation benefits of tea was interesting. I always add a bit of orange juice to kill the taste. I wonder what that does to tea? It seems to be something in the milk--rat cells being tested to find that out.

"In a study of 16 postmenopausal women, those who drank about two cups of black tea without milk had a greater than four-old increase in flow-mediated vasodilation from baseline in the forearm brachial artery (P<0.01), said Verena Stangl, M.D., of the Charité-Universitätsmediz in Berlin, and colleagues.

However, those who drank a mix of 90% black tea with 10% skimmed milk had no more of an increase in vasodilation than if they had consumed two cups of hot water, Dr. Stangl and colleagues reported online today in European Heart Journal." Reported at Medpagetoday.

*Although I'm a coffee drinker, I don't like the taste of my own brew (or yours either), so I've been going out for a cup since I was a teen-ager. While there, I draft my blogs.

3355 Fat pills for dogs

Can you believe it? People are going to drug up Fido so he can lose weight. My solution is much cheaper and healthier. If you own a dog, get up off your fat butt and take him out for a walk or run for 30 minutes a day. You'll both be much healthier. Just remember to take the plastic bag for the feces. If you don't have the time, hire a dog walker--our travel agent, who is also an exercise nut, does this to stay svelte and trim. And if you have a fat cat, take a string and play chase with her for 15 minutes a day. The cat will lose weight, and you'll feel like a kid again and go to bed with a smile on your face.

3353 Ten phrases I would not miss

I've seen end-of-the year lists of over used words, list of new words, and of course, Wired always has it's own list of tired and fired words. Here's my list of meaningless gobbledegook, phrases I'm sick of seeing primarily because they promise more than they deliver.

1. tax initiatives
2. voting irregularities
3. renewable energy
4. bipartisanship
5. mission statement
6. vision for change
7. experts say (also its first cousin, informed sources say)
8. interface
9. segue
10. Islam is a religion of peace

3353 What's going on in Stockton?

Do you ever read those full page ads in the paper called "legal notices" where the confiscated belongings are listed from criminal busts? No? Must be one of my odd quirks. The Drug Enforcement Administration of the U.S. Dept. of Justice lists seized property--there's lots of legal mumbo jumbo so it isn't clear to me if the listed parties can reclaim it or if it will be auctioned. On the list are lots of weapons, watches, currency, vehicles, airplanes, boats, bank accounts, jewelry, and some furniture and electronics. Then there was Strockton, California, and the property seized was grow lights, fans, carbon filters, all kinds of special boxes, etc. Apparently Victoria Chu, Ngai Chung Hung, Roex Hung, Michael Lee, Wing Chou Chan, Wayne Feng and Ka Wai Yu were dabbling in some unauthorized agricultural venture to the tune of a quarter million dollars.

3351 Monday Memories--Grandmother's Hymnal

One of the books I inherited that means a lot to me is my maternal grandmother's hymnal. Here is what we librarians call the bibliographical information and a description of it. I have a 115 page list of my grandparents books which I used for various publications I wrote when I was working. (Aren't you pleased I'm not listing them all?).

The word "Brethren" refers to "Church of the Brethren" an Anabaptist group, although at the time this title was printed, they just referred to themselves as "Brethren." The official term was German Baptist Brethren at that time. My family spoke German for about the first 100 years they were in this country (giving it up around the 1820s) and the Brethren printed the first European language Bible in the colonies--but it was in German, not English.

I used a wonderful program called "Notebook" to make this list, which I no longer have or know how to use (lots of DOS type commands), and could sort by author, title, date, publisher, subject or keyword. Any time you complain about the hymns your church is using--just take a look at what your denomination was singing 100 years ago. It's an eye-opener.

Brethren's Tune and Hymn Book: Being a Compilation of Sacred Music Adapted to All the Psalms, Hymns, and
Spiritual Songs in the Brethren's Hymn Book. Carefully revised, rearranged and otherwise improved. Mt. Morris, IL: The Brethren's Publishing House, 1894. no. 11

Subject: Brethren--Hymnbooks

Notes: Script: "Mary L. George, Ashton, Illinois."
This is a reprint of the 1879 "The Brethren's Hymnbook"
edited by J.C. Ewing, the first hymnbook with four-part
harmony, copyright by Quinter and Brumbaugh Brothers.
James Quinter selected songs from earlier editions.
Today we would recognize few of the hymns in this book.
The Brethren's Publishing House was privately owned.
In 1897 all rights and titles were turned over to the
Church's General Missionary and Tract Committee and it
moved to Elgin. When the Kable Brothers started their
printing venture in Mt. Morris, they used the printing
plant. ("Brethren Press," Brethren Encyclopedia, Vol.
1:193)

View More Monday Memories Participants
My visitors and those I'll visit this week are:Anna, Becki, Chelle, Chelle Y., Cozy Reader, Debbie, Friday's Child, Gracey, Irish Church Lady, Janene, Janene in Ohio, Jen, Katia, Lady Bug, Lazy Daisy, Ma, Mrs. Lifecruiser, Melli, Michelle, Paul, Susan, Viamarie.

3350 Oh lady, you don't want to know!

She wanted to know what sort of cold hearted bitch she was, and I was ready to respond, but didn't want to sign in for one more password. So I moved on, but I really, truly wanted to call her exactly what she'd already named herself. Other words that come to mind. . . whiny, spoiled, self-centered, childish. But maybe it's depression. I think it's what started the women's movement in the 1970s. And children's lives have been going down hill since.

3349 Randy's new blog

Randy Kirk has started a new blog called The God vs No God Debate, and you're invited to join in. Stop by and take a look. Tell him Norma sent you.

The first 5 topics will be:

What are the practical advantages of believing in God?
What are the practical advantages of not believing in God?
Why do Christians feel so compelled to convince others to believe?
Why do atheists want so badly to win the debate?
How should evidence be "weighed" in this subject area?

3348 A new epidemic among teens?

The Dec. 28 issue of New England Journal of Medicine (355:26) has a series of articles on mental illness in teens. Now, it's not that new diseases can't arise--afterall, when my grandmother was a child, virtually no one got polio. It became an epidemic in the 20th century because sanitation improved and children no longer had the harmless mild type. Still, as my class prepares for its 50th reunion next summer, I am sort of wondering why we students didn't see mental illness among our classmates (there were a few teachers I sort of wondered about, however). The lead article suggests the screening of all teens to catch the "silent epidemic of mental illness among teenagers" which is leaving them vulnerable to emotional, social, and academic impairments in later life.

I'm sure if my friends and I had had screening, that the usual anxieties about grades, or mood disorders from squabbles with parents, fatigue from bad schedules or bruised and broken hearts from dating, or poor social skills resulting in rejection by the "in-crowd" would have rated us off the charts for feelings of hopelessness and depression. And I didn't know a single person in my high school who had an eating disorder or a drug/alcohol problem to the extent that we began to see in the late 60s and early 70s. However, I think pharmacologic intervention for huge numbers of teens who might have otherwise passed through a phase of sadness or emptiness without medical help, is a pretty high price. We don't even know the long term results for adults. Does the phrase "follow the money" come to mind for anyone but me?

3347 Go Bucks--but learn to spell

Yesterday at the coffee shop someone had written on the children's blackboard in the back of the shop:

" 'Gator meat tastes like WOLFERINE."

Here is a photo of a wolverine, a member of the weasel family and the Michigan mascot. According to their website, no one knows how the school got that name, although there are some interesting theories. Wild wolverines do not exist in Michigan. Although they've been known to get wild when they visit Columbus.


If I were a betting woman, or if I even followed football, I'd say OSU by at least two touchdowns.

3346 Mandated folate levels

This is certainly odd. Or maybe not. In the 1990s, the federal government mandated folate be added to cereal foods because in pregnant women it can reduce certain birth defects. But. . .

"Fortification of enriched cereal-grain products with the B vitamin folic acid to help prevent pregnancies affected by neural tube defects (NTDs) such as spina bifida and anencephaly became mandatory in the United States in January 1998. Although median serum folate concentrations among nonpregnant women of childbearing age increased initially after the mandate, levels decreased 16% from 1999--2000 through 2003--2004, and RBC folate concentrations decreased 8%." MMWR Jan. 5, 2007

I'm guessing it is certain low-carb fad diets that suggest you not eat bread, rolls, macaroni products, rice, corn meal, etc. The largest decrease was among non-Hispanic whites. You can't mess with Mother Nature--eat all the colors, ladies--just eat less if you're fat. And move more. It works. And be especially careful if you are childbearing age.

3345 One of the best movies I've seen

Finally got my husband to go to Dream Girls with me. Of course it's the best I've seen this year--not too hard since this is only the 7th, but I'd say the best I've seen in a decade. Maybe 2 decades. I'm ready to see it again, and that's really unusual for me. I think Overboard is the only movie I saw twice in the theater.

Every performer was outstanding--Eddie Murphy, Jamie Foxx (I've never liked either one), Beyonce, Anika Noni Rose, Danny Glover--but Jennifer Hudson was just extraordinary. I've never watched American Idol, but I've read about her smack down by Judge Simon. She's Fabulous. Couldn't believe-my-ears stunning. Not just her singing but her acting. Why they call her "supporting actress" I'm not sure unless they mean it as in "foundation" or "no-story-without-her."

The movie doesn't get preachy--if you lived in the 60s you catch the fleeting frames of history--but it does show that greed, bad behavior and infidelity know no racial preference. Yes, you have to suspend belief a bit--you are watching a broadway musical of the 1980s based on a 1960s girl group, in a 21st century movie verson, but as my daughter always says, "Mom, it's a movie!" Yes, it is, and this is what movies should be. Not truth. Not reality. Not a sermon. Just knock-your-socks-off terrific. And who knew Eddie Murphy could sing like that?

Dream girls
Jennifer Hudson
Beyonce Knowles

3344 Those who write for a living also work for minimum wage

or less. "It's a great story but hard to do. Everyone had an agenda and hardly anyone, I thought, completely told me the truth. Worst of all the story took me longer to research and write than any other story I've ever written. A teenage dropout flipping burgers at McDonalds wouldn't accept my hourly wage on this story." Read the whole story, Murder on the Last Turn. He blogs about writing it here.

3343 My baby has her first cavity!

After 15 years of avoiding dentists, my daughter finally went to one she picked out of the yellow pages for her husband, who had a broken crown. She had noticed a tiny black spot on a molar a few weeks ago. The dentist, after she recovered from the shock of seeing an adult mouth with no fillings, told her that because she had not had a cleaning in 15 years, they would need to do it in stages because of plaque build-up. Plaque is the sticky white stuff that forms on teeth and can cause tooth loss from gum disease--even a tooth with no cavities can be lost from poor dental care.

But when the dentist looked closer, there was also no plaque. My daughter brushes twice a day and flosses regularly. However, she also had thyroid cancer about 9 years ago (thyroid was removed), and has some dry mouth, so lack of saliva apparently cuts down on the plaque build up. Whatever the reason--good dental hygiene, good genetics or good luck, the dentist said she'd never seen a mouth like that. And the black spot? Neither the x-rays nor the dentist could find it, so my daughter had to tell them where it was--and yes, it was a cavity.


My baby's first cavity! She'll be 40 this year.

dental hygiene
dentist
gum disease

3342 The Frozen Chosen

I've been following a discussion at another blog about the way WaPo messed up a story about the Falls Church and Truro Episcopal congregations (Fairfax, VA) worship and leaving the denomination. To say the reporter attempted to portray the believers (some prominent Republicans) as weirdo kooks would be mild hyperbole, but close enough. The comments have been as interesting as the original article, and it seems that Lutherans and Episcopalians also use the term "frozen chosen" which originally was a derogatory term for Calvinists, particularly Presbyterians. Anyway, I saw this joke in the comments and laughed out loud.

A young boy was shocked to find that his neighborhood playmates had never been baptized. Thinking quickly, he led them all to the nearest church.

A janitor, the only person there at the time, opened the door and let them in. Upon hearing what they wanted, he led them into the bathroom, where he proceeded to sprinkle each of them with water from a toilet.

Walking home, the boys began to wonder what demonination they had joined.

"Well we can't be baptists," one boy said, "because they dunk you all the way in."

"Well, we can't be Catholics," another boy said. "They pour water over your head and light candles."

After further discussion, another boy finally interrupted in disgust. "Come on, guys, didn't you smell that water? We're 'piscopalians!"

3341 Common errors in English

Oh, I'm in heaven. I could spend all day at this site. I've already learned you shouldn't say make a "360 degree turn" because then you'd be right back where you started. Instead, it's 180 degrees that gets you in an opposite spot--if you're making new year's resolutions, or something.

I saw this at Now Norma Knits another fabulous knitting site. I think knitting blogs are some of the most attractive and interesting in the blogosphere. And here's another Norma with strong opinions. It must go with the name.

And yes, I did make a New Year's resolution, and maybe 2 are still percolating as possibilities. I announced this at my other blog (2nd blog, but I have 10), but I'll reveal it here, since it is now day 6 and I've kept it this long. I am reading the One Year Bible (NIV translation). Each day you get an Old Testament and New Testament passage, a Psalm passage, and some verses from Proverbs.

3340 Today's atheists lack charm

In today's Wall Street Journal there was an editorial that had a very familiar ring. Sam Schulman says today's atheists are no match for their forebearers like George Eliot, Carlyle, Hardy, Darwin, H.G. Wells and George Bernard Shaw. They have no arguments you didn't hear in college and lack charm. He says atheists think religious people like me are stupid, full of superstitions, unsafe for children, full of fables and indefensible. Mr. Schulman goes on to say atheists don't focus on Islamic extremists who openly spew hate and kill apostates. It's people who attend church and actually believe something that upset them. He concludes that atheists are shallow, peevish, unsympathetic whiners who are rigid and preachy. Amen to that.

Now I know what the problem was with an editorial I read in the Upper Arlington News by Richard Ades this week. It was so garbled and poorly written including everything from the 9/11 attack to Merry Christmas attacks that I was hard pressed to make sense of it. But Sam Schulman has shed some light on it. Mr. Ades has been reading Richard Dawkins and watching too much PBS.

I sent a letter to the SNP/UA News. Let's see if they'll publish criticism of one of their own.

3339 White female in charge?

Calm down, Nancy Pelosi. Eighty percent of librarians are female and 89% are white. No one's beating a path to our door. Librarianship is the lowest paid profession that requires an advanced degree. Garbage collectors (usually men) make more. So don't get a swelled head about this position.

"But women weren't just waiting; women were working. Never losing faith, we worked to redeem the promise of America, that all men and women are created equal. For our daughters and granddaughters, today we have broken the marble ceiling."

Marble ceiling, indeed! Lots of libraries have marble ceilings, and floors, and walls. If you want to make a difference in marble buildings, Ms. Pelosi, maybe the Librarian of Congress could be a librarian?

3338 Death of a friend

John Neff, 72, a former teacher at Upper Arlington High School passed away New Year's Eve of Alzheimer's Disease. His wife and I were in a Bible study group "Harried Housewives," many years ago, and in the 1970s, we occasionally went out together as couples. I saw her at the coffee shop this morning and she told me of his merciful passing. According to the obituary published in the Columbus Dispatch, "John enjoyed his teaching career at Upper Arlington High School, where he taught Sophomore English, Psychology, and Humanities, and was the Alcohol/Drug Educator for the district the last seven years of his career. While at UAHS, he developed a course "The Bible as Lit" . . . He was very active at the Hilltop Church of God, where he taught a young adult Sunday school class and was active in the State Board of Christian Education for that church. Since 1983, he had been actively involved at First Community Church, where he taught adult education classes, served on the Adult Education Council, and Spiritual Searcher Committee, serving as Chair at different times of each, and was a member of the Board of Church and Ministry for the Central Southeast District of the U.C.C. For 22 years, he was a member of the First Community Church Chancel Choir which was a deep joy in his life. Following his teaching career, he did some light catering and was quite the gourmet cook. He was a man of many talents and was very widely read. . . The last job he had before his illness robbed him of his health was as manager of the Utzinger Memorial Garden at the Farm Science Review, a job he loved very much. He spent many hours in his own green house planting seeds to be replanted into his own garden and yard."

Services were held at FCC on January 3, 2007 with Rev. James Long officiating.

Alcohol in breast milk and child abuse

Whatever you think about the morality, pleasure or efficacy of drinking alcohol, you can't honestly say it tastes good. With flavorings, possibly some drinks taste less awful than others. I have never tasted beer because it smells like rotten grain, and I think that's why God gave us a sense of smell.

So if you are pregnant or nursing, are you telling me you can't avoid a bad tasting, mood altering drug for 15 months? (9 months + the 6 average for nursing) Come on, ladies--toughen up. The terrible twos and the teen years are coming at you fast. Get a spine. Put down that bottle of beer or glass of Chardonnay. You can wait three hours 'til your breast milk is safe for someone who weighs 8 lbs and is totally dependent on you.

alcohol
breast milk

3336 My letter to Glenn Beck

Hey, I'm on a roll. Just can't seem to stop writing letters.
.

Dear Glenn,

I wrote to WTVN protesting the programming change. Letter here.

Now I'm wondering. I just heard you insult me and President Ford by joking about his funeral. You said no station but WTVN carried it because they were looking for a reason to avoid carrying you (paraphrase, so don't get picky on me). I listened to it on WTVN radio. It was very moving, and I loved the hymns and the eulogies. My husband, sister (Illinois--way out of range for WTVN) and many friends, and some of my blog readers who e-mailed me, also either watched or listened.

Grow up, Glenn. Not everything is about you. There are times you're ahead--you should just shut up while you're there.

Norma Bruce
(you're on here, but I've switched to Cincinnati for today)

3335 And you think you've got thank you notes to write

Look at all the folks Jordan Richards will need to thank!

3334 The minimum wage smoke screen

I suppose I shouldn't complain that the Democrats will try to make hay with this. But it irritates me no end. In Ohio, the voters were dumb enough to add it to the Constitution through an amendment in November! So nationally, we couldn't get that bad.

A tiny fraction of people in this country (520,000 in 2004, mostly teen-agers, most in leisure and hospitality industry) work for minimum wage, and most of them are part timers on their way up to the next wage level who are not the sole support of their family. No fast food restaurant or motel around Franklin Co. Ohio is hiring at minimum--they are probably paying $7 or more to even get someone to finish filling out the application. Even our illegals are getting about $15/hour in the so-called "jobs that Americans don't want." In 1983 I worked for the Ohio Department of Aging on a grant from JTPA--Job Training Partnership Act. (Yes, I was on the dole--but I was a Democrat then.) I remember attending a conference on low income workers. At that time, 24 years ago, we were told that in order to offer a woman what she could get on welfare [Washington DC], she would have to have a job at $10.50/hour to make up for comparable housing subsidies, food stamps, free medical, free tuition, transportation, and pay for babysitting so she could work, taxes and insurance. That was 1983 money. So how ridiculous is it to look like your political party is a saviour of the low wage earner by raising minimum wage?

Every time Nancy Pelosi was on the news today, I changed channels, and finally put in a DVD of Boston Legal.

George Will's suggestion--let the market decide.

Sit down, shut up, and pay attention

I was listening to the local (Cincinnati) talk show in the car this morning and the host Mike McConnell was talking about how over protected children are today. His plan, if he were in charge of the U.S. Dept. of Education, would be, "Sit down, shut up, and pay attention," and it wouldn't cost the tax payers a penny. This made me think of one of my high school teachers, Warren Burstrom, and I think those were his exact words to Glenn Orr and Marv Miller in Chemistry class. We all loved him and learned a lot. Murray sent me these memories of the "good old days" when we were in school. He was class of 1956. I, of course, am much younger.

Scenario: Jack pulls into school parking lot with rifle in gun rack.

1956 Vice Principal comes over, takes a look at Jack's rifle, goes to his car and gets his to show Jack.

2006 School goes into lockdown, FBI called, Jack hauled off to jail and never sees his truck or gun again. Counselors called in for traumatized students and teachers.

Scenario: Johnny and Mark get into a fist fight after school.

1956 Crowd gathers. Mark wins. Johnny and Mark shake hands and end up best friends. Nobody goes to jail, nobody arrested, nobody expelled.

2006 Police called, SWAT team arrives, arrests Johnny and Mark. Charge them with assault, both expelled even though Johnny started it.

Scenario: Jeffrey won't be still in class, disrupts other students.

1956 Jeffrey sent to office and given a good paddling by Principal. Sits still in class.

2006 Jeffrey given huge doses of Ritalin. Becomes a zombie. School gets extra money from state because Jeffrey has a disability.

Scenario: Billy breaks a window in his father's car and his Dad gives him a whipping.

1956 Billy is more careful next time, grows up normal, goes to college, and becomes a successful businessman.

2006 Billy's Dad is arrested for child abuse. Billy removed to foster care and joins a gang. Billy's sister is told by state psychologist that she remembers being abused herself and their Dad goes to prison. Billy's mom has affair with psychologist.

Scenario: Mark gets a headache and takes some headache medicine to school.

1956 Mark shares headache medicine with Principal out on the smoking dock.

2006 Police called, Mark expelled from school for drug violations. Car searched for drugs and weapons.

Scenario: Mary turns up pregnant.

1973 5 High School Boys leave town. Mary does her senior year at a special school for expectant mothers.

2006 Middle School Counselor calls Planned Parenthood, who notifies the ACLU. Mary is driven to the next state over and gets an abortion without her parent's consent or knowledge. Mary given condoms and told to be more careful next time.

Scenario: Pedro fails high school English.

1973: Pedro goes to summer school, passes English, goes to college.

2006: Pedro's cause is taken up. Newspaper articles appear nationally explaining that teaching English as a requirement for graduation is racist. ACLU files class action lawsuit against state school system and Pedro's English teacher. English banned from core curriculum. Pedro given diploma anyway but ends up mowing lawns for a living because he can't speak English.

Scenario: Johnny takes apart leftover firecrackers from the 4th of July, puts them in a model airplane paint bottle, blows up a red ant bed.

1956 Ants die.

2006 BATF, Homeland Security, FBI called. Johnny charged with domestic terrorism, FBI investigates parents, siblings removed from home, computers confiscated, Johnny's Dad goes on a terror watch list and is never allowed to fly again.

Scenario: Johnny falls while running during recess and scrapes his knee. He is found crying by his teacher, Mary. Mary, hugs him to comfort him.

1956 - In a short time Johnny feels better and goes on playing.

2006 - Mary is accused of being a sexual predator and loses her job. She faces 3 years in State Prison.


Gimme 1956 back please!

3332 My letter to Oprah

My husband suggested I turn on the Oprah show--she was doing a program on "class." I watched a few minutes (it was a rerun of an April show), but couldn't handle the twaddle of Robert Reich, Clinton's former Secretary of Labor. Her web site summarizes his thoughts:

Reich "says that a family's ability to provide their children with a quality education, health care and access to other resources determines one's class. "A lot of kids who are poor or working class are not getting the schools that they need and are not having the connections and the models of success that they need."

He notes three indicators of class: "weight, teeth and dialect. In terms of appearance, people who are overweight or have poor teeth are generally regarded as lower class."

I didn’t see the part about teeth but did hear him saying they (lower class and poor) aren't getting good schools. That's been proven false by putting lower class district children into stunning new schools with incredible technology. New bricks don't turn out new scholars. Old values and concerned parents do. Poor families who take the initiative to get their kids into charter schools benefit in the long run. Immigrant Vietnamese and other Asians and even some immigrant Mexicans have managed to move their families into the middle class by hard work and strong family values, not good teeth and good schools.

Here’s my letter to Oprah.

I was disappointed in your "class" show because of the misinformation Robert Reich presented.

The growing gap is not between classes, but between families of married couples and unmarried women with children. Women can virtually eliminate poverty by 1) finishing high school, 2) not having babies as teen-agers, and 3) marrying the father of their children. If her husband takes a job, any job and keeps it, he will almost guarantee their success.

There is still plenty of opportunity in this country--illegals who flood over our borders seeking it is proof of that. But young women need to get smart and stop listening to musicians and boyfriends who call them "Ho" and "bitch" and get down to the business of saving their future children with some backbone and pride.

Maybe you could also open a school for girls here in the U.S.

Source update: William Galston, a Democratic strategist and former domestic affairs adviser to President Clinton is usually acknowledged as the source of the statistics on the relationship between poverty, education and marriage. See James Q. Wilson, City Journal, Why we don't marry. The original Galston source doesn’t seem to be on-line, but every one quotes him. You can look through his bibliography--may be co-authored with Kamarck.

Source update: Kansas City--money and school performance, Cato Policy Analysis . "The lessons of the Kansas City experiment should stand as a warning to those who would use massive funding and gold-plated buildings to encourage integration and improve education."

Robert Reich
Oprah show
poverty
marriage

3331 What I had for lunch

As I noted in September, I decided to lose weight (my 20 blogging pounds) by paying attention to food triggers that made me more hungry. I've lost 17 lbs. and lots of inches where I blog. I've learned to eat to love some foods I'd almost never eaten before, like greens and peppers. Collard greens, turnip greens, bell peppers--red, yellow and orange, and lots of onions. The greens are high in anti-oxidants which help fight all kinds of degenerative diseases and contains trace minerals and calcium. Collard greens (1 cup) have 118.9% of the daily value for vitamin A and 57.6% of vitamin C. But turnip greens are even better with 158.3% of vitamin A and 65.8% of vitamin C. If you have thyroid or gallbladder problems (which I don't) you might want to be cautious about greens, according to The World's Healthiest Foods.

It's awfully hard for one person to eat a bunch of greens before they would go bad, so here's my trick: I lightly saute them with onions in a small amount of olive oil and put them in small individual packages for lunch and freeze them. I don't like those dull, limp, gray blobs you see on steam tables, so these stay bright green.

Today I quickly grilled with a touch of olive oil about 1/2 cup of frozen organic sweet corn with one of my packages of turnip greens and onions, and about a fourth of a red pepper--maybe 1/4 cup. The corn adds a touch of sweetness to the turnip greens which aren't as mild as the collard greens. The mild peppers add color and crunch, and are also excellent sources of C and A. If I were eating a cup, it would be even higher than the greens. My, it was so colorful. Just a pleasure to eat with my book.

With lunch, I was reading The Trouble with Africa, by Robert Calderisi, a Canadian who has worked in Africa since 1975. Africa has received some $600 billion in aid since 1960, yet it has actually gotten poorer since then. It's no longer useful to point fingers at colonialism or slavery, the Africans themselves are making a mess of things, and foreign aid seems to be part of the problem.

For dessert I had fresh pineapple. . . and a Christmas cookie.

3330 So you want to be a writer

A snippet from a poem by Charles Bukowski (1920-1994), who published his first book of poetry when he was 39. To support his writing, I think he must have worked every job except library clerk.

don't be like so many writers,
don't be like so many thousands of
people who call themselves writers,
don't be dull and boring and
pretentious, don't be consumed with self-
love.
the libraries of the world have
yawned themselves to
sleep
over your kind.
don't add to that.
don't do it.
unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don't do it.

unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don't do it.

I think this applies to bloggers too, although he was writing about poetry. I've seen a lot of blogs with only 4 or 5 entries over months and years. Bukowski went on to write more than 45 books. I like to write; hate to publish.

Tomorrow I will start working on Poetry Thursday and won't do Thursday Thirteen for awhile. I'm about out of lists.

thursday thirteen
Poetry thursday
Charles Bukowski
writing
poetry

3329 WSJ features two stories about libraries

Yesterday's Wall Street Journal featured librarianship in its Career Journal section. Gee, most of this good news should have been withheld or the profession will never get the new blood. Must have been a woman writer (see my previous article here).

The writer opines (parentheses are my comments):
1) An aging profession (therefore, there must be opportunity--and haven't we been hearing that since the 1960s when I was in grad school?).
2) Low salaries (you don't want to know how bad they are).
3) Limited opportunities in desirable areas (in rural areas it's $25,000/year and all the snow you can shovel).
4) Expensive advanced degree requirements--ca. $20,000 at a top school like my alma mater. (It's not unusual to find librarians with 2 or 3 advanced degrees because they keep going to school while job hunting.)
5) 80% of the profession is female. (This always depresses salaries and causes a problem in a field that increasingly is computer dependent, a field dominated by men).
6) 89% of the profession is white. (It's not called welfare for the middle class for nothing!)
7) The better salaries are in the private sector (i.e., corporate, but the profession tends to be anti-capitalism).

Then today there was a lengthy opinion piece in the WSJ by someone named John J. Miller, who suggests that libraries should hang on to Hemingway, Proust, and Solzhenitsyn even if it means crowding out the latest John Grisham and David Baldacci. He uses the Fairfax Co. VA system which apparently has installed a circulation system that will flag books for withdrawal (that's the librarian's sexy term for "dump it") when it hasn't circulated (librarian's term for check-out a book) for two years. He thinks libraries should be cultural repositories because they can't compete in today's world of Amazon.com, i-Pod and MP3.

". . .librarians should. . .discriminate between the good and bad, the timeless and the ephemeral . . . as teachers, advisers and guardians. [They shouldn't be] clerks and stock boys at grocery stores."

Oh dear! Sometimes it is hard to know if someone is writing tongue in cheek. He apparently doesn't realize that librarians already are acting as guardians of the public welfare. They are more liberal than the ACLU or Barbra Streisand and Tim Robbins combined. Just go look at the issues and forums on the web page for the American Library Association and read the Bush bashing.

E.S. Browning pitches like a girl

Several times I've written posts about the differences in writing style between men and women. Most of my examples come from the Wall Street Journal. Women staff writers of this publication use fewer idioms, less colorful language, and usually include more direct quotes. Their articles also contain a "yes, but. . ." lead if they are presenting anything positive about the economy or culture. Or they hate to commit. The good news will be placed near the bottom, if you persevere through their stodgy style. Let me offer some examples by writers whose names clearly indicate their sex.

First the guys in yesterday's paper:

"The hedge-fund locomotive ran into some impossible obstacles but for the most part kept chugging ahead in 2006." Gregory Zuckerman

"Latin American stocks surged to a 4th straight year of double-digit increases, their longest streak in at least 19 years, as global investors increased bets that big economies such as Mexico and Brazil have bid "adios" to a rocky past of one crisis after another." John Lyons

"The deal-making world can hardly suppress its glee about 2006, which will go down as the best year to date. Business has been so good that some are gritting their teeth, afraid their luck may somehow run out." Dennis K. Berman

And now the ladies:

"Bond investors enter 2007 divided about the prospects for the U.S. economy. They will find out in the coming months which camp has it right." Serena Ng

"Asian stocks logged another year of gains, but it wasn't an easy ride for investors." Laura Santini

"As the air rushed in and out of the crude-oil market in 2006, the breathless rise and surprising fall dominated discussion of whether the commodity boom could last." Ann Davis

Notice the next time you read WSJ, Forbes or Business Week: The men who write about business, politics and economics heavily use gambling, sports, technological, automotive and agricultural idioms, anecdotes, methaphors and analogies. They play games with words and tease the reader just a bit--using double meanings, puns and ambiguities. They coin new words, invent proverbs, use slang, and get sloppy with foreign words, like using "adios" in my second example (for Brazil it should be Portuguese, not Spanish).

The women, on the other hand, are more literal, timid and bland. If they do use figurative language, the phrase is probably so commonplace, we don't even notice, i.e. they are as dull as dishwater but hit the nail on the head. They tend toward touchy-feely and weakly emotional words to humanize the markets--"disappointing performance," "hoping it starts strongly," "outlook is cloudy," "could fizzle," etc.

So all this leads me to E. S. Browning. He writes like a woman. The exception that proves my rule. In fact, because of his use of initials (his friends call him Jim according to one article I Googled), I'd always figured he was a female--that and his straight-forward, gloomy, no-nonsense writing style. He's a 27 year staff writer veteran for the Journal and is the writers' union representative, according to articles that quote him.

"Investors are approaching 2007 with a high degree of optimism--perhaps too high, some skeptics worry." E. S. Browning

3327 Today is the day

to send thank you notes for the gifts you received, the parties you enjoyed, and to the people who were a bit less fortunate, losing a loved one over the holidays or experiencing a reversal in good health or personal life. And I don't mean e-mail. E-mail just doesn't cut it for special occasions, sympathy, or sincere thank yous. Open the desk drawer, pull out a card, find a pen and a stamp. Then you can lie awake at night solving the world's problems without these details popping up. If you're a Democrat, write a note to remind your congressperson about all the promises made. If you're a Republican, drop a note to those who are still in the game about why the others were voted out. Those guys don't need paper and stamps--send e-mail--it will all go in the circular file anyway.

Oh yes, and take down your outside lights.

3326 Losing weight isn't rocket science

says Tara Parker-Pope, the health writer for the Wall St. Journal. Make tiny changes she says, and see some amazing results. If you love a daily Starbucks Grande Latte (260 calories) on your drive to work, switch to coffee three times a week, and you'll save 21,840 calories, or 6 lbs a year. Skipping shredded cheese on your lunch salad is 10,000 calories a year, or another three pounds. There--you've got a good start on the next holiday season.

3325 Correcting the myth of DDT

Steven Milloy of Junk Science.com had a letter in the WSJ last week correcting the myth of thinning bird eggs that had appeared in one of their articles.

I can't find the letter online, but he essentially provides the same argument in this Canadian publication, "Bald-eagle DDT myth still flying high."

As early as 1921, the journal Ecology reported that bald eagles were threatened with extinction – 22 years before DDT production even began. According to a report in the National Museum Bulletin, the bald eagle reportedly had vanished from New England by 1937 – 10 years before widespread use of the pesticide.

A 1984 National Wildlife Federation publication listed hunting, power line electrocution, collisions in flight and poisoning from eating ducks containing lead shot as the leading causes of eagle deaths. In addition to these reports, numerous scientific studies and experiments vindicate DDT.

So millions in Third World countries needed to die and continue to die for lack of DDT, and birds' eggs weren't even thinning. Where are the bleeding heart liberals when the poor and brown of the world need them? Probably off somewhere supporting Castro and grieving for Saddam.

3324 Columbus' first baby of 2007

is Miguel Angel Naranjo. His parents Maria and Rodriguez left Mexico four months ago. Fearing a birth defect that runs in the family, they wanted the good care their infant would get in the the USA.

No word on legal or illegal entry, or whether they are married, or how they made their way to Columbus, Ohio, or who is paying for this. On the plus side, the child didn't have the defect, so we've been saved that cost and the child has been saved corrective surgery.

Cross posted at my blog on illegal aliens, Illegals Today.

3323 Listening to beautiful hymns

The hymns sung for the President's funeral have been wonderful. Right now, I'm listening to "For all the Saints." It makes me wonder if today's thingies sung at contemporary church services, the "it's all about me 'n Jesus" repetitious choruses, will ever sound this good if repeated often enough?

3322 Art is an investment

in beauty, the future, and good thoughts. We buy a lot of art. In fact, we have so much art we didn't know what we had until we threw an art party in December 2001 in our former home and set everything out for display, including t-shirts with original screened art for Bible school.

However, we don't buy and collect for investment. I don't envy our daughter trying to figure out what to do with it after we're gone and she and her brother have their walls and closets full. We already store some of my husband's paintings on their walls. At Christmas our son was "loaned" a golfing painting and a fishing painting for his house.

The December 18 WSJ had an article on investing in the art market. Art is illiquid, unregulated, commissions can eat you alive, galleries do not need a license, the art indexes do little, and no one seems to track unsold art. Whew! So much for investment value.

Our way is much better. 1) Buy what makes your heart skip. 2) Buy from artists who are also your friends. 3) Buy from a menu of representational and realistic art, with an occasional "mystery meat" to spice it up. 4) Buy small enough so it can rotate in and out of the storage closet. 5) Buy what works with your tastes and decor--it's your home, not a museum or gallery.

I've updated my spread sheet on artists and media, and we have 70+ artists in our collection--each one a little treasure. Friday we're taking down a show, and bringing one home that my husband bought from another watercolorist--I haven't seen it yet, but I'm sure I'll love it.

3321 WTVN drops Glenn Beck

And they hear from me. (I've yet to find that writing a letter does any good, but I do it anyway.)

Program Director
WTVN 610 AM Radio
2323 W. 5th Ave.
Columbus, OH 43204

Dear Sir,

When I heard last week that you were dropping Glenn Beck for a locally produced talk segment, I couldn’t believe my ears. I immediately started switching to 700 am in Cincinnati just to see what was available nearby. And although it is irritating to hear all the commercials and announcements for events or companies I’ll never patronize, it will be better than listening to more hours like the Saturday morning guys who call Bob Connors to whine about the Buckeyes or pot holes .

My husband and I were furious when you dropped Dr. Laura in the fall of 2001, apparently for her opposition to gays adopting infants, because nothing else she was saying was politically charged--unless it was urging people to be faithful to their spouses. I suppose that might have offended some of your staff. When I called the station to complain, I got no response except “We’ll pass your comment along.”

It took awhile to get accustomed to Beck‘s style, but I do listen about 3 out of 5 days, depending on what my schedule is, and always in the car during drive time. I’m tired of being jerked around for whatever your program director’s personal biases are. I appreciate good business methods, and Beck was #1 in this market. Hello! Get smart this time. You’ve got a winner on radio!

You’ve lost this listener, not just for this time slot, but for others like Connors and Corby. I can get great talk shows from California on the Internet. I’m not going to take a chance on being part of your audience in this time slot again.

Glenn Beck
talk radio
WTVN Columbus
Dr. Laura