2398 The new doctor

Actually, I could have walked to the dermatologist's office this morning. It was my first visit so I wasn't positive where he was located. He said the tiny spot on my lip was pre-cancerous and would need to come off--sometime. But not now. It comes and goes, and although it was around last week, it snuck out in time for this appointment, so he says to call when he can see it better. The spot on my arm that isn't pre-cancerous, just ugly, he zapped (froze) and now it has a blister about the size of a nickel. I'm very fair, and I've not tried to get a suntan since I was about 19, but apparently it is the sun exposure you get as a child that is so dangerous. My husband is 3 or 4 shades lighter than me (i.e., almost colorless), and is now really paying for attempting to warm up his skin tones each summer at the lake until he was about 50. If you have red hair, don't do that.

Speaking of suntans, April is National Cancer Month. It is also National Poetry Month. And National STD month. Maybe I would write a poem with these themes . . .

2397 Does your kitchen make you fat?

Maybe so, but not for the reasons you might think. Take a look.

2396 A Free Education Site

Free- ed.net offers a number of courses (I looked at Spanish and Poetry) that are completely free. I didn't see any gimmicks and the site is easy to use with very little annoying bling and blash. It doesn't offer diplomas or certificates--this is for the self-motivated you. Read the FAQ carefully. I wandered into it looking for SweetHaven Publishing Services, which has apparently changed directions. The address is Westerville, OH.

2395 What puzzles us

is that any thinking person believes The Gospel of Judas is somehow going to rattle our faith. And of course, The DaVinci Code is leading the parade softening them up. Christianity Today author Darrel Bock writes:

"This is a time that tries many a believer's soul. Works are coming out like rounds from a machine gun. But none of the guns fired so far are the "smoking gun." They are more like pop guns, creating a lot of noise but no damage."

He did, however, find one redeeming quality in the book. Read about it here.

Saturday of Easter week-end, the holiest season for Christians around the world, one of the morning news shows--either CBS or NBC* (doesn't really matter since they are Tweedle Dum and Dummer)--had that theological giant, an editor from Newsweek, tell us the significance of Jesus. It was almost too comical to be insulted and outraged.

*My kitchen TV isn't connected to cable and the reception is so poor I can hear voices but not tell faces.

2394 What I saw at the library

The check out line was long at the public library last night. The middle-age woman in front of me had quite an armful and dropped some, and I got quite an eyeful. Hip huggers went down, short t-shirt went up and tattoos were revealed down the butt crack. EEyew! Fifty years from now someone in a nursing home will be changing her diapers and get quite a chuckle.

2393 Tuesdays with Morrie

While the rest of the nation was keeping this title by Mitch Albom on the best seller list for four years, I was working and reading committee reports, unjamming printers, and teaching search strategies about bovine diarrhea. But I saw a like-new copy at the Friends of the Library store yesterday for $1, so I bought it. Today we drove to our son's home for lunch (he's on vacation and putting in his garden) which is about a 40 minute drive, so I started reading it in the car. Marvelous book. Short. Well-written. Wonderful insights on illness and the end of life. I'm going to check with our book club archivist and see if this was a selection before I joined. If not, I will definitely recommend it for next year.

Read an excerpt

2392 Refer a friend, get a gift

When we moved here about 40 years ago, we selected a bank for very sound reasons--it was near by and it was the only one with Saturday morning hours. We're still with the same bank, and it may be the only one around that hasn't changed names.

This week we got a handsome flyer from a "banking office associate" suggesting we refer a friend for a checking account and we'll both receive a gift. So I looked at the picture of the gifts. The umbrella is the only item I can identify with certainty. It will require a $50 deposit to get the free gift, and there will be a $20 closing fee if you close it within 180 days. And you have to report the gift value on IRS Form 1099. Trust me. This is not a $20 umbrella, and the other two thingies, well, who knows? So, find your own bank.

Monday Memories

Did I ever tell you about the time we took the marriage test?
We don’t remember the exact date, but I think it was in the fall of 1965. We’d been married five years and I was in graduate school. A local television station in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois was planning to run a marriage advice news story with a test for viewers after the evening news. Somehow we became part of the control group. I believe “experts” at the university prepared the test. We in the control group were to take the test first, then the people watching at home would have a basis of comparison. We’re both a bit fuzzy on the details forty years later. It doesn’t seem like very sound methods to me now because all the control group was part of a young couples group at a local church in Champaign which means we were either students or employees of the university.

After taking the test, my husband and I waited for the results, feeling quite good about our answers and pleased that we’d been invited to participate. Imagine our surprise when we discovered we’d both scored in the 60% range! Almost everyone else got 90% or better. My husband, who rarely gets riled about anything, hissed, “They lied.” In fact, when I asked him about his recollections at dinner last night, he responded, “They all lied.”

To soothe our disappointment that we were a failure not high scorers, we were told that at least we’d scored high on “values,” (how we managed finances, aspirations, etc.) and that we both had similar low scores on the other questions, meaning I suppose we were in agreement on many topics, even if we were wrong. We were told then that more marriages fail over values (particularly how to handle money) than any other problem.

As the anniversaries piled up--10, 20, 30, 40, and moving on to 50, we’ve had some good laughs about the day we flunked the marriage test. And we've wondered about what became of the top scorers.
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2390 LARK Program for Terrorists

I saw this over at the blog of Father John, who is Russian Orthodox. It is a [made up obviously] response to people concerned about the treatment of Iraq War and Al Quaeda detainees:

"Thank you for your recent letter roundly criticizing our treatment of the Taliban and Al Quaeda detainees currently being held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.Our administration takes these matters seriously and your opinion was heard loud and clear here in Washington.

You'll be pleased to learn that, thanks to the concerns of citizens like yourself, we are creating a new division of the Terrorist Retraining Program, to be called the "Liberals Accept Responsibility for Killers" program, or LARK for short.In accordance with the guidelines of this new program, we have decided to place one terrorist under your personal care. Your personal detainee has been selected and scheduled for transportation under heavily armed guard to your residence next Monday.Ali Mohammed Ahmed bin Mahmud (you can just call him Ahmed) is to be cared for pursuant to the standards you personally demanded in your letter of complaint.
It will likely be necessary for you to hire some assistant caretakers.

We will conduct weekly inspections to ensure that your standards of care for Ahmed are commensurate with those you so strongly recommended in your letter.Although Ahmed is a sociopath and extremely violent, we hope that your sensitivity to what you described as his "attitudinal problem" will help him overcome these character flaws. Perhaps you are correct in describing these problems as mere cultural differences. We understand that you plan to offer counseling and home schooling.Your adopted terrorist is extremely proficient in hand-to-hand combat and can extinguish human life with such simple items as a pencil or nail clippers. We advise that you do not ask him to demonstrate these skills at your next yoga group. He is also expert at making a wide variety of explosive devices from common household products, so you may wish to keep those items locked up, unless (in your opinion) this might offend him.

Ahmed will not wish to interact with you or your daughters (except sexually), since he views females as a subhuman form of property. This is a particularly sensitive subject for him and he has been known to show violent tendencies around women who fail to comply with the new dress code that he will recommend as more appropriate attire. I'm sure you will come to enjoy the anonymity offered by the burka --over time. Just remember that it is all part of "respecting his culture and his religious beliefs" -- wasn't that how you put it?

Thanks again for your letter. We truly appreciate it when folks like you keep us informed of the proper way to do our job. You take good care of Ahmed - and remember. . .we'll be watching. Good luck!

Cordially, your friend,Don Rumsfeld
posted by Fr. John McCuen April 10, 2006

2389 Tagged by Cozy Reader and Ames

Six weird things about me is this meme. So here they are. Then the rules say I go to another six sites and say, "You've been tagged. Visit my blog."

1. I think I've done this one, but I blog so much I can't remember. But that's not so weird. I've started some memes, and no one wants to play. Isn't that weird?

2. I have another blog about my hobby, and I haven't found anyone else with this hobby. I think that's really weird because anyone could love this hobby.

3. After almost 50 years of not singing with a group, I joined the church choir. That's not what is weird. Well, OK. Just a little. No one has asked me to leave yet. . . now that's weird.

4. I like deli cole slaw and potato salad. After I buy it I almost double the quantity by adding ingredients I have at home (like apples or carrots or raisins for the slaw or potatoes and eggs for the potato salad), but that isn't weird. What is weird is that it doesn't even change the flavor. Do you suppose they use a tad too much salad dressing and spice?

5. Blonde librarian says you can tell Americans (in Germany) because they eat their French fries with their fingers and wear white athletic shoes. I don't care if anyone knows I'm an American, isn't that just too weird, and when we go to Helsinki and St. Petersburg I will be wearing white athletic shoes if I have to walk far. I also say "WARSHINGTON DC" and I don't intend to change it for the Finns or the Russians.

6. I have deliberately removed an entry from my blog that was drawing too many hits. Call it ping-inflation-pong if you wish, but I didn't like it. Isn't that weird when so many people add all sorts of doo-dads, banners, and wiggles to attract pings that mean nothing in terms of readership and I'm going the other way?

Here's a bonus: this is Cozy Reader's site, but if you are using IE, it will shut you down, so you'd best use Firefox.
Ames is here.

2388 Bad news for the left

A new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine (354:11; 1147, March 16, 2006) apparently finds that differences among socioeconomic groups makes little difference in the quality of recommended health care. After collecting data for 439 indicators and 30 chronic and acute conditions they learned:

women had higher scores than men

younger people (under 31) had higher scores than those over 64

Blacks and Hispanics had higher scores than whites

household incomes of over $50,000 had higher scores than households with incomes less than $15,000

Health insurance was unrelated to differences in quality of care.

It's hard to get grant money if you publish the heresy that gender, age and race don't matter in your health care quality, (or if you poo poo global warming) so I wonder if this group will even get a second chance to dig deeper--and I hope they do. Plus they really had to haul out the excuses and explanations.

"We were measuring different dimensions or indicators of quality than had previously been studied."

"When we confined our analysis to indicators used in previous studies, we found better care for whites."

"Previous studies focused on invasive and expensive procedures rather than routine health care."

We considered nonresponse bias, but that didn't explain it.

We even looked at poor record keeping to explain our results.

We might have missed the most vulnerable and screwed this up because they didn't have phones (paraphrase).

Well, they did their mea culpas and decided that what we really need is to make large scale system-wide changes anyway because veterans (using the VA health care system) were scoring much higher than the general population in quality of health care. So there are problems, but they just couldn't say it was based on income or social class or race or gender.

health care, New England Journal of Medicine, health insurance, minorities health

2387 It's not the TV; it's the snacks

Why is an article about watching TV in a chronic disease journal, I wondered. So I took a peek. It was about obesity. Watching TV makes us fat. But I think you have to be eating while you watch it.

"More than 2 hours of television viewing per day was associated with a high mean body mass index and overweight or obesity in both men and women. Other characteristics associated with watching more than 2 hours of television per day were being 50 years of age or older, having a high school education or less, living in a household with income below 131% of the federal poverty level, and not being employed. Adults who watched more than 2 hours of television per day had high intakes of energy and macronutrients and were more likely to be overweight. They also obtained more energy from snacks and supper. A higher percentage of adults with health conditions watched more than 2 hours of television per day compared with adults without health conditions." Preventing Chronic Disease, April 2006

I don't snack while I watch TV in the living room because I don't want spots on the furniture or carpet. Now snacking while I blog. . .

2386 Apologies are in order

To my family and friends who are church musicians [and you know who you are], I want to apologize for sitting in the pew all these years and being clueless about how hard you work every week to help us praise the Lord. The choir sang at three services this morning (jokes were being made about pitching tents); we sang Christ is Risen (Paul Sjolund), Wondrous Love (Alice Parker and Robert Shaw) and Hallelujah chorus (Handel) at the Sunrise service (practice at 6:30 a.m.); then at 8:30 Christ is Risen, When he comes again (Lari Goss), and Hallelujah (practice at 8 a.m.); and at 11:00 Christ is Risen, When he comes again, and Hallelujah. However, Allan Willis, our organist played Carillon de Westminster (Vierne) and Toccata from Symphony V (Widor) multiple times, the offertory 3 times, Finale Jubilante (Willan), plus all the hymns you sing on Easter for three services plus all the special music for the two communion services, plus playing with us when we sang and the brass ensemble. And Michael Martin, our choir director, did all those three services plus he played the piano at a fourth service at 9:45 directing the small group ensemble that sings for the contemporary service. This followed the services we sang on Maundy Thursday evening, Heavy (Nagy) and Remember Me (Sterling), and Good Friday evening, when we performed The Cross said it all (Goss), The Lamb (Tavenor), and O Love Divine (Helvey). And of course, there were preludes, hymns and offertories for those services, too.

I think I'm singing a little better than two months ago, but I'm still not contributing much except showing up. I'm practicing at home on the Midi that my son loaned me. I've got some squeaks and squawks that aren't going away. It's probably not a good plan to lay out for 50 years. I'll give it a little more time, but I'll never regret what I've learned about church musicians the past few months.

church musicians
church choir
Easter music
UALC Columbus, OH

2385 The Gay Book Burners at Ohio State University

Tammy Bruce writes about the strange case of a librarian who submitted a list of titles for consideration, and it made a gay guy feel "unsafe" (Christian books), so he sued for sexual harassment. The left is losing it. Freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and freedom to read are in the deep freeze. What do you bet American Library Association won't come to this librarian's defense. Too busy distributing anti-Bush buttons.

See also Sister TolJah

Volokh Conspiracy

2384 Chris White now in Afghanistan

Here's his last entry from Ft. Bragg. Good photos too.

2383 A walk in the park

To get my 30 minute walk in this morning, I took along two items that needed to be returned to the library, then parked about 1/2 mile from the library, which is located in the park. So I was listening to the radio and when I tired of the garden guy making me feel guilty (cucumber peels will drive away ants I learned), I switched over to Dennis Prager. Actually, I didn't know he was available locally, but I've occasionally heard him via a California AM station on the internet.

"THE DENNIS PRAGER SHOW is different from every other radio talk show in America. First, Dennis talks about everything in life. Everything—from international relations to family issues to religion to sex. Second, Dennis is not only very smart, he is very funny. Third, he brings a moral perspective to every topic. Fourth, he is relentlessly interesting. That is why, after 20 years on Los Angeles radio, he is the most respected broadcaster in Southern California. He is now taking that reputation to a growing audience nationwide. The Los Angeles Times has described Prager as an “amazingly gifted man and moralist whose mission in life has been crystallized: to get people obsessed with what’s right and wrong.” That’s what he does everyday, for three terrific hours." Salem Communications

Prager, a Jew, said (this is a paraphrase) that although the right occasionally thinks unclearly, the left always does. The left sees morality in terms of rich and poor, and strength and weakness. If you are rich, you are bad. If you are strong, you are bad. Therefore, everything about the USA is bad. Israel is bad because it is richer and stronger than Palestine. The left hated Reagan more than Brezhnev. That's morality from the left (keep in mind I'm paraphrasing because I didn't have a pencil and paper with me).

Well, I used to be left of center; I was a humanist and a Democrat. But even when I was an evangelical Christian I was still voting and registering as a Democrat until 2001. Not all Democrats deny the role of personal responsibility--you can find a lot of them in AA and Al-Anon, and those folks know that it wasn't poverty or injustice that caused their elbows to bend so that their brains fell out.

Even in my most liberal days, I never believed that abortion was anything other than the destruction of a human being no matter what party supported it and never will. I've always disagreed with the "Palestinians just want their homeland back" argument that many mainline Christians support. At least during the last 30 years I've thought the UN and the National Council of Churches were sops for money of well meaning people. I've always thought it was our responsibility as Christians to take care of the earth, and thank you, if it had been up to the Republicans to get the job done, I wouldn't own a home on Lake Erie which is now clean enough to enjoy. For many years I was a pacifist, but that was my religious upbringing (Anabaptist), not politics. Most pacifists have lost their spiritual core as near as I can tell. They don't advocate peace in their personal lives, which is where it needs to start.

I part company with many evangelicals who may also be politically on the right in that I see nothing scriptural in denying ordination to and keeping women out of the pulpit, although it is practical and essential if you want a growing church. I don't believe in the death penalty and I don't think machine guns and uzzies are what the founding fathers had in mind. Nor do I think gun registration for law abiding citizens will reduce the crime rate at all, so there are other motives.

That said, if Prager is correct that the left thinks of morality in terms of rich and poor and strong and weak, then I agree, they cannot possibly think clearly about moral issues. I'm sure he's had much more to say on this topic, but it is something to think about, isn't it? While walking in the park.

2382 Dance with the one who brought you

is a charming idiom meaning you may have to do some payback from time to time to keep a job, a friend, an appointment to a board, an account, or your reputation. It's about a type of loyalty with your fingers crossed behind your back (or his back).

I have a hobby blog called In the Beginning which is about premier[e] or first issues of magazines, journals and serials. Today I was looking through my newest purchase which is Lily; beautiful living through faith, Spring 2006 (I can't find a link to this title). It is published by Meredith Inc., the publishing giant whose best known title is Better Homes and Gardens. I haven't finished looking through it, but the first issue is lovely. Knowing Meredith, we can look forward to a huge increase in advertising content, which for BHG must be about 70%.

My gripe is simple: Ellie Kay writes a column on finances, and the question she is responding to is about how to save money on food. According to the question, this family of four spends $700 a month on food. So how does Ellie Kay respond? She claims her family saved more than $8,000 last year on food and household goods by using, 1) manufacturers' coupons, 2) double coupons, 3) store coupons, 4) loss leaders, 5) price comps, 6) sales and clearances, and 7) comparison shopping.

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. She's dancing with the guy who brung her. The advertisers. Food companies are not in business to give away their products, but she knows that most American shoppers believe they are. She knows that food companies are heavy advertisers in Meredith's publications. I'll give her #4 and #6, but #5 and #7 just take too much time. Either she's misplaced a digit, or she has a huge family of 24 children, because $8,000 is more than I spend on food in a year. All coupons are just advertising and they either introduce a new product or cover up a price increase. The time it takes to organize and combine them could be more effectively used by just popping that potato (twenty cents a pound) into the microwave, rather than "saving" twenty-five cents on a prepackaged or frozen item that figures out at about $5.00/lb.

She's wrong for these 10 reasons and maybe more. To reduce your food bill without coupons:

1) contribute your own labor where ever possible. It's probably faster to prepare fresh broccoli and carrots than to use the frozen. If you used prepackaged greens for salads (wash very carefully) you can mix with those that are fresh.

2) Shop the walls (or where ever the produce and dairy and meat are displayed). I often buy marked down meat if it isn't past the due date. You have to be really careful about reduced fruits and vegetables, but for applesauce or pie, there's no problem with a soft apple.

3) Don't buy in huge quantity sizes, especially if you are overweight. Large sizes often are not cheaper per ounce, they'll go stale or past the due date, and you'll be tempted to "just clean up this last bit." I've never seen a cupboard or pantry of an overweight woman that wasn't loaded with "giant economy" sizes.

4) Prepared snacks are extremely expensive per ounce and are loaded with all the calories, salt and fat your family doesn't need--switch to homemade or popcorn, or sliced fresh fruits and vegetables. But if you must have them, try the dollar brands or some of Trader Joe's which cost about half and actually taste better. If you want to cut the coupon habit and calories, just stop buying high salt, high sugar snacks. Roust your kids from the computer and teach them to spread some peanut butter on a cracker. It's cheaper. Don't take the kids shopping if you can help it, and definitely don't keep them quiet or entertained in the store or car by handing them a snack.

5) Learn which house brands are good at about half the price and don't require any coupons for "savings." Do you really care if a peach is a bit ragged or the beans aren't uniform size?

6) Loss leaders are just that--they are sold at a loss to bring you into the store. But don't waste gas at $2.80/gal driving from store to store to find them. Where I shop, milk and orange juice are almost always loss leaders, but I shop there because they don't have a loyalty card program, which also raises prices.

7) Look carefully at what you buy in the name of "food." If you also buy a lot of Health and Beauty and cleaning products (in Ohio we call them taxables since food isn't taxed), at least recognize that you don't eat them. Perhaps a trip to a different type of store would be worthwhile. Because I shop at Meijer's I also buy most household taxables there.

8) Read the labels. Refuse to buy water and fake, plastic food. If you look at anything "low fat" or "low calorie," water may be the first or second ingredient, and you'll pay more. Buy the regular, and add water at home. I add a little milk to creamy salad dressing when the bottle is low, and never notice a taste change. Don't buy fake cheese (cheese food?--yuk) or low calorie cheese. Such a waste of flavor and money. This fake food is heavily promoted with coupons.

9) Don't be suckered with brand differentiation or repackaging coupons. Have you ever tried to buy a plain old Ritz cracker? Ridiculous. Sort through 12 kinds of Ritz to find what you want.

10) I do buy prepared and frozen food, and I've found Trader Joe's to have the best and most reasonably priced in these categories. I can buy things that would be too expensive or wasteful to buy for just 2 people, or would lose nutritional value before we could use it up. But I never use a coupon unless the manufacturer has attached it to the package, and I already had intended to buy it.

coupons
Meredith Corporation
Ellie Kay
Lily

2381 Praying about the public library

Can't say I've ever done that. Here's someone who does. Now why didn't I think of that?

2380 Cruciate ligament injury and repair in dogs

The Wall Street Journal ran an article this week on the possible $6,000 vet bill you might have down the road for knee surgery for your dog. Yup. Even that "free" pup you got from the neighbors which you now love, that sleeps with you and which you treat like a member of the family. Dogs have five times the number of knee procedures as humans--about 1.2 million a year, and it isn't because they have more legs. It only affects two of their legs. And if you get one repaired, whamo, the other one will most likely go. Also, it requires a lot of rest and inactivity for the healing time, so good luck Bucko, on keeping that small horse size dog in the laundry room quiet and happy while you're at work.

I tried doing a literature review of this topic because all the major core veterinary journals are indexed in Medline, which is available free in PubMed. However, one of the things I've learned since leaving the library profession is that most of these databases have been so tweaked, that whatever you knew last year, but especially five years ago, means nothing today and you might as well stick with Google. Google will give you not only the leads to scholarly articles, but to the various veterinary clinics that will put the surgery and recovery text into understandable English. But add the word "veterinary" into your search strategy to avoid getting the research on humans that might be done on dogs.

Call me just a cranky ol' cat owner, but here's my guess why this injury probably is on the increase:

Some dogs are being bred to be way too large--given a natural selection without human interference, most breeds wouldn't be anywhere near the huge sizes you see today. Probably about 12-14" at the shoulder. This body mass is very hard on legs and joints and internal organs. They also don't live as long as smaller breeds.

People are overfeeding and underexercising their pets, but especially the large dogs. Those extra pounds affect their knees just like they do the owner who is huffing and puffing along side him in the park.

I want to holler at dog owners in the park who are jogging with their dogs making them run on concrete sidewalks. Would it be so bad to jog in the grass? Have someone else run him in front of you and take a hard look at the gait I'm seeing as you go past me.

Taking a sedentary dog, cooped up in an apartment or kitchen for 14 hours, out for a chase or run in the park where he'll be twisting and turning and jumping for Frisbees, looks like a recipe for knee disaster to me. At least do a slow warm up. You'll both benefit.

cruciate ligament injury
dogs

2379 Three foodie events

Several weeks ago, someone who reads this blog suggested that I buy Trader Joe's frozen brown rice when I mentioned I couldn't cook a decent rice dish. I tried it; I loved it. Then over at Gekko's blog I saw an item that people who eat beans weigh less than people who don't. Then Tuesday at Meijer's I saw a product I'd never noticed before--canned purple hull peas--which I purchased after reading the nutrition content (high in fiber and protein).

After checking the internet, I learned that purple hull peas are really not peas, but beans. They are one of the versatile cowpea family and are also called black eyed peas, or pink eyed-purple hull peas. I think I can see why the label might say purple hull rather than pink-eye, since that is the name of a disease. They are more common in the south and may have come to this country from Africa with the slave ships and probably originated in India. They have their own promotion board and festival.

I opened the can, heated a small portion, and had some for lunch one day. I liked the flavor and texture better than any beans or peas. Then I decided to add them to the brown rice, which I'd been fixing in the microwave (3 minutes) and then refrigerating and using about 1/3 of a package mixed with fresh broccoli and a little butter for lunch. I've never cared much for red beans and rice, partly (my southern friends say) because you just can't get a decent canned red bean up north. I really don't care for the texture of kidney beans, pinto beans, red beans, navy beans, butter beans, etc. But purple hull peas. Now there's a bean a northerner can enjoy!

Ham and fresh purple hull peas