1744 Three signs your marriage might be in trouble

When I sit down to blog, I have no idea what I'm going to say (except for those entries drafted while I read the paper). Today I was innocently writing about an apron pattern, and ended with 3 ways to know a marriage is in trouble.

1743 WMD in Iraq

This advertisement was attached to the most recent Novak-Evans Report. I have not gone to Iraq to check this out, but I hope someone beside Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame have. Their reporting is a bit dicey.

WMDs Found in Iraq!

1.77 metric tons of enriched uranium

1,500 gallons of chemical weapons agents

17 chemical warheads containing cyclosarin (a nerve agent five times more deadly than sarin gas)

Over 1,000 radioactive materials in powdered form meant for dispersal over populated areas

Roadside bombs loaded with mustard and "conventional" sarin gas, assembled in binary chemical projectiles for maximum potency

This is only a PARTIAL LIST of the horrific weapons verified to have been recovered in Iraq to date. Yet Americans overwhelmingly believe U.S. and coalition forces have found NO weapons of mass destruction. The question is: WHY do they believe this lie?

Richard Miniter explains why these and other popular media factoids and urban legends are not only wrong, but severely damaging to our war effort, in Disinformation: 22 Media Myths That Undermine the War on Terror.

1742 Book Club tonight

We're doing Spin Sisters by Myrna Blyth. But I'm not there. Went to the doctor today for this cold that has lingered longer than usual and I have pneumonia, first time since I was in grade school. So I'll just snuggle up with a good cat instead of a good book. After a breathing treatment and 3 medications, frankly, I feel much, much worse.

1741 Bone tired, always?

There are good, solid medical reasons to be tired all the time. Various sleep disorders, narcolepsy, shift-work disturbances, post polio syndrome, stroke, post-head injury, Parkinson's Disease, Multiple Sclerosis, hypothyroidism, ADD and Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) to name a few. No matter how much you sleep, you're always tired. And if you can't get the right kind of sleep, you're not going to ever have energy.

Go to the library (or to Google) and research Provigil or Modafinil. It works miracles for some, does nothing for others. Check it out. Ask your doctor--always.

I feel their pain

After the Suze Orman show on MSNBC, I didn't change the channel and a feature came on about a couple with a six figure income living in Buffalo who were having a struggle making it financially. They've already borrowed against their home equity. The wife is a SAHM with an MBA who is still paying off her college loans and has three children. The house and cars were very nice--not palatial, but better than anything I've ever owned. They appeared to be in their early 40s.

Then today USAToday featured the Hetmers of Rockwall, TX, another family (blended) with a six figure income, wife has two jobs and the husband has a sales job that has a base of $30,000 and then he works on commission. He'd been making about $130,000, and this is a new job, probably a step up. They can't borrow against their home equity, because they have none, and have an interest only mortgage. She too is paying off her college loans, and now has decided that her college age son should borrow her half of the costs (his father pays the other half), so they'll have two generations of college loans in that family. She is about 41.

What do you want to bet that neither family tithes their income to a church or synagogue? And yet that's about the best way to stay out of debt that I know of. I don't know why it works, but it does. If you start early enough, you won't have any excess cash to fritter away on eating out or shopping as a hobby. Later, when it's a habit and not a hardship, it will help you focus on what's important in life.

Back to Suze Orman (soapbox alert). I enjoy her show and her dramatics. It's well-paced with good advice. But I wish she'd slap some of these "living together" couples up side the head instead of giving them advice on investments. Living together without marriage screams "lack of commitment," so why should they be mingling funds just because they are mixing body fluids? Marriage isn't always a good financial base, but shacking up never is.

1739 Liberals have all the interesting advocacy programs

In government, the conservatives have all the new and innovative ideas, but in organizations, clubs and workshops, the liberals have cornered the market. I was reading the local freebie paper Saturday at the coffee shop and noted these meetings about town.

CURE [Citizens United for the Rehabilitation of Errants] life skills workshops

8 week course on justice/public policy

Bicycle advocacy group for transportation

Green Party monthly meeting

Earth Institute--Simple living, voluntary simplicity and "deep ecology."

Impact Safety program--self defense for women and children

Mercy for animals--rights of all animals

Arts Relief--art supplies for hurricane victims

Surviving the Violence luncheon

Spirit of the 60s Coffee House

Abortion Access Fund

Health, peace of mind, and mental clarity workshop

Choices for victims of domestic violence

Equal justice

Jewish GLBT

1738 Did Bush get instruction before the Latin America trip?

Generally, when you greet friends and relatives in the Latin culture, here's what you do. When a male greets a female or when a female greets a female, they will gently touch both arms while moving their bodies to about 6 inches apart, then they cock their heads, put their cheeks together, and make a light kissing sound. Their lips don't actually make contact with anything. All this will take about 1 or maybe 2 seconds. For men greeting men, in most areas, it is completely customary to give each other a hug. This may seem unnatural for many people outside of the Latin culture, so you may have to practice hugging a few times before you gain any close friends or relatives that live in Latin areas.

Spanish lesson

1737 The poulets have come home to roost

says Dr. Sanity, "and we should not be glad of it, because this could mean the beginning of the end for a free Europe." She's gathered some comments from other blogs here.

1736 Nothing's changed since I was in school

Actually, a lot has, but not this--students don't like to be called on. Usually, because they aren't prepared. In fact, I'm a little surprised anyone had to study this. But 200 introductory psych students were questioned about "being called on."

"The “top five” behaviors that 125 introductory psychology students said they use to avoid being called on (each endorsed by over 50 percent of the sample) included:

• Avoid eye contact.
  
• Look like you are thinking of the answer (but have not come up with it yet).
  
• Act like you are looking for the answer in your notes.
  
• Act like you are writing in your notes.
  
• Pretend to be reading something course-related.

Other responses included dropping a pen or notebook to look busy, hiding behind the person in front of you — and even a write-in response: pretend to be asleep. Constructive, preemptive participatory behaviors — such as raising one's hand to say something related to the topic or to ask a question about the topic — were endorsed by less than 20 percent of students."

This doesn't sound terribly imaginative of either the students or the authors, but the authors do have some suggestions on getting a discussion going.

1735 More negative news about alcohol advertising

"A study slated to appear in the January issue of Psychological Science suggests the mere presence of alcohol-related images -- including those in advertising -- encourages aggression even if people aren’t drinking." That's all I know, because the issue isn't available yet.

1734 Who owns the computer system on which you're reading this?

Ad Age reports something surprising (to me) about blogs--551,000 years of paid work time is being spent on blog reading! Yikes. Turn me off right now and go back to work, you slacker! And if you're listening to AMC on headphones or a tiny TV stuck in your desk drawer, turn that off too.

A report last week by Advertising Age Editor at Large Bradley Johnson noted that about 35 million workers -- or one in four people in the U.S. labor force -- spend an average of 3.5 hours, or 9%, of each work day reading blogs. This blogification of workplace time is no minor concern -- the total losses across the national work force are estimated to be the equivalent of 551,000 years of paid time that is being spent on blogs via the employer's own computer systems.

Another important point was that the time spent reading blogs on the job was in addition to the time already spent surfing the Web in personal pursuits. The debate appears to be one of reasonable limits. At what point, or at what length of time, does the use of company assets for personal activities become unreasonable? And is the problem likely to become an even greater one as more and more TV content goes online, becoming easily accessible from one's office computer? Do employers need to find new ways to police their computer systems?

AdAge.com

1733 Free marketing and promotion advice

for librarians (but would work for various agencies who are clueless) in ten parts is currently running at Ex Libris. I can't say as I think much of the author's example [Tia Dobi] of the DoD as selling a product for "killing," but once she gets off her liberal soap box, she has some good things to say about how and how not to market libraries.

There are some people who by personality and profession are not inclined to use public libraries--my family, for instance. My daughter and I were together Friday evening for dinner. She brought it in because I've been ill and she stayed until about 9:30. She was explaining to me the plot and intricacies of her latest read--The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova. Big, big book. She looked at her watch and said, "Oh Barnes and Noble will be closed. I want to buy 1776." "Don't you ever use a library?" I asked. (I'm totaling up in my head not only the pages, but the cost--it's a mom-thing). "Never. I like to own my books."

OK. I can accept that, but what if libraries had a decent advertising campaign at anytime except when they want to pass bond issues? What if their staff smiled and acted like they were happy to see you, the way boutique clerks do? What if they stopped talking to each other, and asked if you needed help? What if they bought more than 5 copies of books on the best seller list for 2 years? Do librarians think people are immune to advertising? Why is it that magazines, TV and newspapers actually support their product with advertising and appealing to their niche market, if it won't work on the homogeneous general public within driving distance of the public library?

Then there's my husband. He always has a beautiful, fancy library card because he uses the library so rarely, he is always issued a new one each time he shows up. Mine is about 30 years old and has a glued bar code on it because I stop by about once a week. But even that is way down from what it used to be before the internet, databases on-line, and Google.

Come on, librarians, toot your horns a bit.

1732 There's this guy in Bucyrus

who sells gasoline about 15 or 20 cents higher than the competition. Friday it was $2.39 for regular and Saturday he had dropped to $2.29, but the Mobile and Shell were $2.17. Around here the Sunoco is selling for $2.15, and the cheap gas places are probably less. So I'm thinking, how does this guy stay in business? It isn't just one week-end, but week after week. He's always way higher than stations two blocks away. Surely he can't be living on the loyalty of his relatives and the naivete of motorists coming in from Columbus and Cincinnati. He also has the dirtiest restrooms this side of the Third World--which I discovered the last time we stopped there. When I complained to the cashier she told me it wasn't her job. Well, maybe not, but did she go across the street when nature called? It was a sewer.

Maybe he sells something else and tries to keep the rest of us away.


Bucyrus has two beautiful murals that look like you could walk right into them

1731 Save a plant and it might return the favor

Plant and animal biodiversity isn't just for tree huggers. We've got Lyme Disease because the white footed mouse doesn't have enough natural enemies, and we need to protect the plants too, because they may be the source of treatments that will prolong our lives. This is not saving a snail species because it has "rights" but because it is the smart, productive and safe thing to do.

"Preserving biodiversity also means preserving a reservoir of as-yet-undiscovered medical treatments and cures. Consider the cancer drug Taxol, made from the Pacific yew tree; morphine, which was initially derived from poppies; and Artemisia, which yielded chloroquinine and other treatments for resistant strains of malaria. In addition, microbes -- the most diverse organisms on the planet -- also hold promise: aminoglycosides, a group of antibiotics used in the treatment of severe infections, were derived from a bacterium found in tropical soil.

Animal species too are treasure troves of medicines: the cone snail yields a toxin (recently FDA-approved under the name "Prialt") that is a thousand times more potent than morphine as a painkiller but does not lead to tolerance or addiction. That same snail also yields a broad-spectrum anti-epileptic used for the treatment of intractable epilepsy. It should go without saying that the destruction of species such as these means that potential cures are lost forever. Even species that may seem inconsequential to human life (like soil microbes or cone snails) actually have the potential to improve human life greatly -- if they are not driven to extinction."
American Council on Science and Health

1730 Creating a piece of art?

I found a neat site called typoGenerator. Type in the words, change the font, or colors or background, or toss two of the three and move on.

Not sure I like these colors, or pink flamingos

This might be better

This is such fun!

1729 Ohio should vote

NO on Tuesday there's a bunch of incomprehensible issues on the ballot--called 2,3,4,and 5. They address absentee voting rules (Issue 2), campaign finance laws (Issue 3), the drawing of legislative boundaries (Issue 4) and replacing the Ohio secretary of state with an appointed board (Issue 5). The liberal organizations are supporting this wholeheartedly. They are still mad that Bush won Ohio by 180,000 votes last November. Still think he stole the election. The voice over ads on TV and radio say absolutely nothing, on both sides. Here's how Richard Finan sees it:

• Issue 2 would allow more people to vote before the election but contains not one provision to assure voters that those votes are protected from fraud. In fact, in combination, Issues 2 and 5 obliterate Supreme Court rulings, Ohio attorneys general opinions and secretary of state policies that have protected the integrity of the vote in Ohio for generations.

• Issue 3 would limit the dollar amount people could give to candidates but would allow special interests never-before-imagined opportunities to stuff secondhand money into campaigns. For example, while it would prohibit Ohio’s employers from making political contributions, it would allow millionaires, such as Jerry Springer, the 2004 Democratic man of the year, to spend his own money unchecked for his promised campaign.

• Issue 4 would snatch the vote out of the hands of Ohioans while replacing that vote with a board of bureaucrats sealed off from the public. Ohioans have in every decade since 1970 thrown the rascals out, when they wearied of a party or its leaders. It is hard to believe that Ohio voters do not relish this power or that, as some reformers have said, are too easily tricked into misusing it.

Then comes Issue 5, which would remove the secretary of state as Ohio’s chief elections officer. That job, performed by dozens of different Democratic and Republican elected officials for generations, would be handed over to another appointed board. The board would mean more full-time state jobs and benefits for bureaucrats. The bureaucrats would set their own salaries, vacations and staffing needs, and taxpayers would get the bill."

1728 Debunking the myths of journalism graphic design

Although I didn't know there were myths about design of newspaper graphics, after reading this article at Poynter, I can see it. Some, I even think I've heard, although I'm no journalist. But I certainly think rag right is easier to read than justified right. Oh, the horrors of justifying paragraphs when we used the typewriter!

"Somewhere along the way, the myth developed that justified type conveys more of a hard news feel -- and that and rag right is more featurey. Readers don't make any differentiation between the two. Some reasearch has shown that rag right is easier to read because justified text can create large spaces and more hyphenation. Either way, the achieve the best reader experience, it's important to have someone with a skilled eye tweaking the size, letter and word spacing, and acceptable hyphenation."

Read the article, Debunking Myths by Ann Van Wagener

1727 And liberals complain about Christmas?

What would they do with these holidays so beautifully described and visually enhanced by Avik (see Oct. 10)?

"With the beating of drums and a surge of humanity flocking marquees since the morning despite warnings of thundershowers, the five-day Durga Puja, the biggest festival of the Bengalis, began in West Bengal on Sunday.

The festivities begin from Mahasashthi (the sixth day from the day after Mahalaya), when the priest unveils the goddess Durga during a puja known as bodhan.

This is followed by the three main days of Mahasaptami, Mahaastami and Mahanavami when the chanting of hymns, arati and anjali (floral offerings with chanting of hymns by men, women and children in new clothes) mark the rituals.

The fifth day of Bijoya Dasami, when the idols are immersed, marks the end of a carnival in West Bengal that goes beyond religions and communities."

1726 The continuing devastation in Alabama

Most teen bloggers write about the opposite sex, clothes and tech-toys. Not Rebelution. These teen brothers who are homeschooled have written about the wake-up call they got when driving through ground-zero of Katrina. It's still a mess, they report. They couldn't find a restaurant open, nor a grocery store to buy food. They needed to have their car repaired, and discovered there was no way to use a credit card. Residents of the area were still driving 50 miles to get gas. People are still living in tents. It's not over 'til it's over folks, and the press has gone home.

"In the past two weeks Alex and I have driven along the Gulf of Mexico from Montgomery, Alabama to San Antonio, Texas and back. We were struck not so much by the devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina, but by the continued devastation. There have been three major hurricanes since Hurricane Katrina hit in late August: Ophelia, Rita, and Wilma. And while it has been legitimate for the media to switch their attention to these new natural disasters, a perhaps unintended consequence is that most Americans, not directly affected by Katrina, have assumed that unless an area was just "re-hit" by Wilma, everything's "O.K. down there." To most, it's old news."

1725 Google's Sergey Brin

I just love Google. As a librarian, I'm not at all distressed that it is achieving librarianship's goals of access to information for everyone even while threatening to put librarians out of work!*

But I especially love that one of its founders, Sergey Brin, is an immigrant. Is this a great country, or what? And not just any immigrant, but he's from Russia. I was a Russian major in college and most of my classmates were immigrants--Ukraine, Latvia, Lithuania, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Poland, etc. I think I only met one or two actual Russians.

Google's new plan to digitize works still under copyright is explained in Lawrence Lessig's November column in Wired. It's short and to the point and easy to understand.

And would you believe, my ancestors were immigrants too?

*The American Library Association has come out against torture and the war in Iraq, but has said nothing officially about Google's digitization project. They're leaving that up to publishers and authors.