2936 Fall down go poof

My F: drive has stopped working. It recognizes files on a disk, I can even use them. But if I try to copy from my hard drive to a disk, it tells me to put a disk in. This means if I down load my photos to my computer I can't select and copy to a disk to have them printed, because the drive never finds the disk. Also can't back anything up on a disk. Anyone know what the problem is?

2935 Is Brian Ross being Rathered?

The amount of Foley material being amassed by Brian Ross at ABC, and the length of time he has held it just to release right before the election is "Rather" suspicious. Is it gay bashing when you get this explicit Mr. Ross, or is it a gay outing by a militant gay group mad at Foley for not supporting them, or is it just politics as usual for the Democrats and their media buddies who are hoping Republicans will split over this? There is no type face to compare as there was in the CBS Dan Rather meltdown, just some instant messages from "who knows who?" An astute page clever enough to save that many messages? My, he must have a future. If these are real, I'm surprised Foley was bright enough to run for dog catcher let alone Congress.

The folks behind the folks behind Ross.

Brian Ross
Dan Rather
Mark Foley

2934 Glenn Beck's off base today

He's horrified, as we all are, by the killing of school children in Pennsylvania yesterday. The man who picked up the Amish farmers' milk everyday slaughtered their daughters and granddaughters and no one knows why. It is so unthinkable that even finding a motive won't clear your brain. Glenn's website.

But Glenn is using one man's madness to launch an attack on modern society. Why I don't know. He's tossed in cell phones, Hollywood, mothers who work, and families not eating together into one big foul stew. I think a lot of things are wrong with society, like Nagin being reelected by the people he failed in New Orleans, like our former pastor's adultery, like allowing felons to work at our ports, like encouraging young girls to yearn for stick like bodies, like U.S. Moslems turning a blind eye to Jihadism. But no, I'm not going to accept any of the blame for one crazy milk man from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania who murders children after hugging his own good-bye at the bus stop.

Glenn Beck
Amish

2933 And if he were your boss or colleague?

What would you have done? Because I was a librarian, I worked with many, openly gay men (and some that were in the closet). Certain careers have been gay-friendly over the years, and gay men have enjoyed positions of prominence, power, and publishing in library science and technology. Back in the 60s we just assumed the aging spinster librarians living together were doing so for convenience and security--the fact that they were lesbians in long term relationships went right over my head.

I knew the monogamous and the promiscuous ones, and several who had also formerly been married. One of my former male employees was still married to his wife the last time he visited me, but he's now a she, so I'm a bit out of the loop on the sexual dynamics of that coupling. It's just more than I want to know. My favorite boss of many years was gay, and his long time partner was often included in social activities. Even in the weeks before he died and I visited him in hospice, he tried to be cheerful and up-to-date on what was happening at the library despite his pain. And so the dilemma of what Foley's colleagues knew and when they knew, hits close to home for me. I truly don't know what I would have done, because it is human nature to make excuses for the failings of friends and colleagues. And it is also human nature to guard your own career ladder and not chop off any of the rungs you need to advance.

Mark Foley was openly gay, his homosexuality apparently well-known on the Hill, and a Republican congressman from Florida. The mainstream media isn't praising his fellow Republicans for accepting him for years as a colleague and friend. No, Foley's homosexuality is never mentioned, but the "failure" of his colleagues and superiors to protect underage boys is. Tricky business, ratting on a friend, a superior, or a "protected" person in today's political climate, isn't it?

In today's upside down world of political correctness, Foley's colleagues' assumed failures are looming much larger in the media than his known disgusting behavior. I think ABC was the first to break the story. A story they sat on for some time before it was trotted out after the deadline for a new Republican to get on the Florida ballot. They showed even less concern "for the children" than Foley did.

There's an editorial about this in the Wall Street Journal today, which has implications for your job and community too. Here's my thoughts:

• Do you assume the colleague's behavior is predatory if you notice something odd,
• or do you wonder if you're being homophobic, or prudish if the colleague isn't gay
• Or are you afraid you'll be accused of being homophobic putting your own career in jeopardy if you say something?
• Do you ask or tell another colleague about it
• or is that gossip if your suspicions are groundless?
• Do you talk privately to the offending colleague or boss (yeah, boss, that's gonna happen!) assuming he won't torpedo your career at the next team evaluation?
• Would you instigated an investigation of e-mail at work?
• Would you go to the ombudsman or personnel director if you knew they were also homosexual, or known to be promiscuous
• Would you know which privacy laws you might be violating?
• Would your private discussion go into your personnel record?
• Do you assume gay men are going to be targeting gay boys?
• And what if the gay boys like and encourage the attention the same way straight teens enjoy attention?
• is this another round of political correctness because of the big push for children to become comfortable with their sexuality?
• Would you alert the child's parents, who may not even be aware of his sexual orientation.

Yes, a lot to think about before you rat out a colleague.

It's my blogiversary

Three years ago today I started blogging. Counting my group blog and my LIS journal and my six other blogs besides this one, I show a little over 4200 entries. Then I went back and filled in October 1, because it didn't look tidy. And I'm really posting this on October 3, because I forgot the date.

2932 Rush was right

While listening to Rush on my walk today, I heard him say that Republicans wouldn't know how to smear cream cheese on a bagel, referring to how Democrats are bringing out various smear stories in the remaining weeks before the election. "Oh come on--don't you remember Lewinsky?" I said to myself. "Or Condit?" "Or Kennedy?" "Or labor unions' links with mafia?" or when Dick Armey called Barney Frank, Barney Fag (although that's not exactly a smear).

However, when I brought up Explorer today, my RoadRunner news flashed the story, "Scandal rocks GOP." So I typed that into Google and got about 1.5 million. I only glanced at 10-20. Then (since there is not an equivalent acronym for the Dems) I tried DNC, but those were mostly about the DNC smearing Republican candidates written by angry bloggers. Then I tried with quotes, "scandal rocks Democrats" and I think I got 3 or 4. Republicans never even got a good shot at Sandy Berger, even though I'd be in jail if I tried to do what he did.

Rush was right. They couldn't smear a bagel. Or the media is awfully silent when the page is on the other hand.

Monday Memories

Last week my husband took some of his watercolor paintings up to Delaware, OH for an art show. All were accepted. So today's Monday Memories is a photo from the Upper Arlington Art Show of 1975. This show started as an art exhibit for local artists in 1966 near the Miller Park Library with about a dozen artists. Don Dodrill, a painter friend of ours got the ball rolling. Then when it outgrew that space, it moved to Jones Middle School for a few years, then up to the city building on Kenney Road, across from the OSU golf course. That's where this photo was taken. The show is now in Northam Park each Labor Day and attracts tens of thousands.

1975 Labor Day Art Show
Although we have lots of paintings in our house, and many at our children's and relatives' homes, we also buy art. We bought 2 watercolors in Russia this summer, and here is the painting we bought from Don Dodrill, the founder of the Upper Arlington Labor Day show.

This is a bit fuzzy, but I wanted Don in the picture.

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2930 It may come back to bite them

The left branch media and those that like salacious news stories (that about covers it, doesn't it) should probably slow down on this Congressman Foley story. They are shifting the spotlight from the one to blame and making noise about the lack of supervision by other Republicans. Yeah, like the Democrats supervised Ted Kennedy and Bill Clinton's sexual behavior. They got reelected.

However, The Man-Boy sex lobby is much bigger with Democrats than Republicans; after the gay marriage and polygamous marriage lobbies finish with us, saying we're denying civil rights to people who are just doing what's natural for them, we'll hear a lot more from the pedophiles. I'd show you the websites of both gays and lesbians who promote sex with minors, but I don't want them dribbling their cookies on my hard drive.

Why Foley's checked himself into alcohol rehab, I don't know. Alcoholics don't become pedophiles from pickling their brains. Pedophiles have screwed up values and might drink on the side to forget their problems. No 10 step program is going to help him. In our 21st century world, people who have sex outside the marriage bed (as described in the Bible), whether it is with their own gender, their neighbor's wife, or their uncle's dog, want to claim all that matters is their feelings. Foley is in the group that thinks sex with male children is his natural right.

Foley is obviously a gay pedophile, just like there are heterosexuals who are pedophiles. Or the bi-sexual, married blonde female teacher having sex with young male students is another example. That doesn't mean all gay men solicit underage males, but a lot do, and they have their own political agenda. That agenda is to decriminalize sex between minors and adults. They're hoping to get the law changed so they don't go to jail, in my opinion, or they want legal, disease-free sex. Sure, the rest of us call this abomination pedophilia, but they don't.

Democrats can be outed for all sorts of kinky, illegal and weird behavior and get reelected. It just doesn't seem to work for Republicans. For that I'm glad and I said good riddance, Mr. Foley.

2918 Two political sleazeballs

Don Surber's got a good one today about the Democrat's glee about Foley, the Florida Congressman caught with his pants almost down chasing some male pages via the internet while writing legislation to protect children. However, their own sleaze monkey, former Governor McGreevey, was allowed to time his resignation so the Dems didn't lose the office and then appeared on Oprah as a victim. Oh yes, and a book. Always a book. And since I'm retired, I'll just suggest you go into the stacks and find it by yourself. But look out for the weirdos. They aren't all on the internet.

2917 A cancer blog

Larry Sievers writes a Cancer Blog at NPR. It's pretty interesting because he addresses many of the thoughts and platitudes that appear in the lives of the survivors, patients, family, friends and co-workers. The above link is to the entry on how a cancer patient should respond to a smoker.

Update: Sievers died in August 2008. This link no longer works.

My vote would be for knocking him down and stomping on his cigarettes, but I was definitely in the minority. See comments.

Every teenager who thinks it looks so cool to light up and have smoke burn your eyes and nose and make you stink should read Ruth's comment:

"I have smoked since I was 13-years-old and I am 61 now. Smoking to me is like second nature. Yes I have tried to quit but without success. In my life I've been told that I have achieved things others could not do on their own. I lost over 60 lbs with sheer will power and kept it off. I used to drink vodka everyday; I knew it was not good for me but couldn't stop for the longest time. I no longer drink today, sheer willpower. I've been told if you could quit eating and drinking you should be able to quit smoking, but I just can't. I have cancer and am going to have surgery to remove (hopefully) the entire tumor within 30 days. I've finished the pre surgery chemo, it did shrink it a little bit so now I have to see one more doctor, a lung doctor and were ready to schedule. I have esophageal/stomach cancer, I'll have two surgeons operating, one on my stomach and one maybe on my chest. I know I'm a damn fool but I think the only way I can quit smoking, is if they lock me up, which is about to happen. I have to stay in the hospital between seven and ten days, it scares me to death. Wish me the best. No lectures please."

2916 The Truth is Inconvenient

"In May, our nation was exposed to perhaps one of the slickest science propaganda films of all time: former Vice President Gore’s "An Inconvenient Truth." In addition to having the backing of Paramount Pictures to market this film, Gore had the full backing of the media, and leading the cheerleading charge was none other than the Associated Press.

On June 27, the Associated Press ran an article by Seth Borenstein that boldly declared “Scientists give two thumbs up to Gore's movie.” The article quoted only five scientists praising Gore’s science, despite AP’s having contacted over 100 scientists. http://www.usatoday.com/weather/news/2006-06-27-inconvenient-truth-reviews_x.htm

The fact that over 80% of the scientists contacted by the AP had not even seen the movie or that many scientists have harshly criticized the science presented by Gore did not dissuade the news outlet one bit from its mission to promote Gore’s brand of climate alarmism. http://epw.senate.gov/pressitem.cfm?party=rep&id=257909

I am almost at a loss as to how to begin to address the series of errors, misleading science and unfounded speculation that appear in the former Vice President’s film Here is what Richard Lindzen, a meteorologist from MIT has written about "An Inconvenient Truth." "A general characteristic of Mr. Gore's approach is to assiduously ignore the fact that the earth and its climate are dynamic; they are always changing even without any external forcing. To treat all change as something to fear is bad enough; to do so in order to exploit that fear is much worse." http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110008597 "

From "Hot & Cold Media Spin: A Challenge To Journalists Who Cover Global Warming" speech by Senator James Inhofe, Chairman, Senate Enivornment and Public Works Committee, September 25, 2006

The one area I might disagree with Sen. Inhofe, is when he says, "The American people know when their intelligence is being insulted--when they are being used and duped." For starters, that's almost a campaign slogan used both by the right and left. But more tragically, I meet a lot of gullible people who have swallowed these lies and truly believe that humans have the power to control the climate. They have refused to look at centuries of climate data and trends and can only remember a decade of mild winters, or last year's hurricanes, if that. The previous global warming scare was around the time I was born, so mostly I remember the coming ice age scare of the 70s and 80s. That's warmed up a bit now. The Gullibles (or Democrats or Humanists) don't want to look at the Kyoto results, or the increasing population of polar bears, or the huge sums environmental groups spend on political campaigns. They just want to be afraid, worried, and in power.

Climate Change
global warming
An Inconvenient Truth

See also:

http://epw.senate.gov/pressitem.cfm?party=rep&id=212247
http://epw.senate.gov/pressitem.cfm?party=rep&id=213589

2915 Global Warming

There's a slight hope that Americans are recognizing the scam and hoopla of global warming. Grich has a nice overview of Monday's speech by Senator James Inhofe, who is the chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, and his concern that the media is accepting lies and half truths and alarming the public.

"Since 1895, the media has alternated between global cooling and warming scares during four separate and sometimes overlapping time periods. From 1895 until the 1930’s the media peddled a coming ice age.

From the late 1920’s until the 1960’s they warned of global warming. From the 1950’s until the 1970’s they warned us again of a coming ice age. This makes modern global warming the fourth estate’s fourth attempt to promote opposing climate change fears during the last 100 years."

Climate Change
global warming

2914 The NIE leaker

The Democrats and their fellow travelers have lessened the chances of a timely withdrawal from Iraq, in my opinion. We saw it happen in Vietnam, with the young John Kerry-types in the forefront of the protests, giving hope and comfort and energy to the enemy, and it's happening again. Although as long as Bush is President, we probably won't run out on the people we've put at risk by liberating them from a tyrant.

But I'm really wondering about the latest government leaker. He seems to be in cahoots with the guy lowering gasoline prices. The NYT obviously took the terrorism quote out of context, but it can't be refuted without divulging critical information by releasing the whole thing, so we have accusations of "cherry-picking" from both sides. What the President has chosen to release is much more damning to the Democrats than what the leaker released to the NYT. We know the leak is related to the coming election, because the report is so old. So that doesn't look real great for the Dems either. It seems to be the old timey story of the media in bed with the Democrats, except. . . This global terrorism increased threat when you really look at it, is Muslims killing Muslims--all over the world. Many more than U.S. forces have killed. And before George Bush, they were going after us, here and abroad, and succeeding, too. Whether Clinton was busy with other adventures or he just had bad advice, he didn't push back.

Given human nature, and the history of past wars, is there some reason why their violence would NOT escalate when someone started to push back. Afterall, they aren't Democrats who run when someone says "boo."

Andrew C. McCarthy says, well duh, Osama said it in 1998!
Daniel McKivergan quotes Richard Clarke, one of Clinton's favorite sources in defending himself on Fox News.
Bull Moose notes that the Iraq war did not create Jihadism.

2913 Log-in requirements

If there's anything that leaves me cold at a good blog, it is the log-in or registration requirements. Yes, I know, you could say blogger.com requires it, but at least most people using blogspot allow anonymous comments. The most recent aggrevation was Article VI Blog. They had some good ideas on the Mitt Romney candidacy (theme of the blog is politics, religion and the constitution). However, you can't comment if you're not registered; in fact, you can't even send a general thought to the site owner if you don't have a log-in. I would have e-mailed the guy that he had a nice site. I can't remember a zillion passwords (already have 10 or 12 + 3 e-mail addresses). I checked the site's forum and I think they had 29 people registered. Need to open a few windows before they get stale. It's a good site, but way too restrictive and I probably won't return. On the Thursday Thirteen meme days, I'm down to visiting blogspot folks unless I know ahead that I won't have to jump through hoops to comment. And using Mr. Linky just means registering twice, so I avoid that too.

2912 Property reappraisal

We had dinner last night with fellow Lakesiders--i.e., we all own property in a vacation community on Lake Erie, where the land is owned by an association. We lease our land and the house only has 730 sq. ft. So we get virtually no services from the county, or the township who sets all our codes and rules, and almost no children live in the town because most home owners live elsewhere. We are not counted among the 40,000 residents of the county (over one billion in taxable property), but about 60% of the families who do live there have no children.

We were all stunned by the new increases. Are they gold plating the gymnasium of Danbury Township High School? Of course, we don't vote in that district so we have no say in how they divvy up their golden egg (i.e. Lakeside), but I think they are close to killing the goose, and if not that, the character of our little community. Increasingly, only the wealthy can afford to buy there, and in recent years builders have been building spec houses, and even some three or four "locals" are buying up multiple properties.

First, the actual year around residents who live and work in Ottawa County or nearby sold out and moved to less expensive towns; now many retirees are selling off because the taxes are quite high (for nothing in return). When the wealthy move in, we've noticed their "wants" and "gotta-haves" start changing the very reasons they bought property there. Their homes are professionally landscaped and decorated; their donations to the various fund raisers carry much more weight than the folks who have more modest means; they populate the various boards and committees. In checking the county stats, I see that Ottawa County has half the Ohio poverty rate--about 5%--probably because all the poor had to move!

Second homes accounted for the last real estate boom. So if you've bought one, you've probably experienced the same thing.

Technorati has 26 posts tagged Lakeside, Ohio and most of them seem to be mine. So here's one more.

Lakeside, Ohio
Ottawa County Ohio
property taxes
vacation homes

2911 Natural tobacco

Have you seen the ads for "natural tobacco?" The one I saw the other day reported that it doesn't use any of the 464 chemicals found in other cigarette brands (I don't know if they are all in the same cigarette, or if they are adding several brands together).

Oh goody. A real natural death, instead of an unsafe, chemical death. And the various lung associations and health organizations say this is just a marketing ploy (as are most products marketed as "natural") because even without the synthetics, they may contain higher levels of nicotine and tars. Bidis or beadies, the poor man's cigarette, which are flavored, are particularly bad.

Most chronic, addicted smokers started as teen-agers. By the time their brains have matured and they can make sound choices, the nicotine pull on the brain function is very strong, overriding their common sense.

2910 A healthy heart

If you're reading this, you're probably younger than me, just because of the average age of bloggers. Maybe feeling smug about that? I'm your mother's age--or gasp, your grandmother's? Touch of ageism? That's OK. I was that way too when I was in my 20s and 30s. Thought the good life was all about being young. Why, I'm not sure, since most of the really happy and secure people I knew back then were all older! They'd all successfully met challenges and were enjoying life. Go figure. I didn't know then I would live to be over 65 or be married almost 50 years--just assumed it. Most people in my family did.

It's a fact. Everyone ages; but we don't all do it the same. And it's always been that way. The maximum life span really hasn't changed much. We're saving a lot more babies, and licked many childhood diseases, so the average lifespan has changed, but we've always had the old-old. If I can trust my genealogy research, many of my great-great-greats lived well into their 80s and some into their 90s. In fact, you can't choose your parents, and for all the hoop-la about environmental hazards and mad-cow and E. coli, there's only one thing you can do that's a sure fire way to get older by extending your own lifespan.

I was born with a heart problem--an extra circuit that acted up more and more as I got older. I didn't know I had an electrical misfire, and neither did my doctors, because unless you're having tachycardia or arrhythmia while you're at the hospital or clinic for something else, no one finds it. And if you've lived with it all your life, you just think light-headedness is normal. This flaw in my circuitry was discovered 10 years ago and I was medicated to control it. I had an ablation in 2002 to destroy the circuit, was medicated again until the rhythm was right, and then since about 2004 have had the heart God intended.

Miracle of modern medicine--pharmaceutical research and surgical skill. You bet I am. But the only thing I can do personally to slow down the actual aging of my heart is caloric restriction. It is not the same as lowering my body weight. Reducing body size through exercise doesn't have the same effect. "Decreasing caloric intake by 30% or 60% significantly prolongs maximal lifespan in laboratory animals when instituted at young or middle age." [Journal of the American College of Cardiology, vol. 47, no. 2, 2006]

This is bad news for those of us raised on a typical Western diet. We want to blame the transfatty acids, or McDonald's or dirty air, or something in the water, or the Bush Administration for not funding more programs in schools, but the fact is we're in charge of prolonging our lives by reducing our caloric intake. Caloric restriction delays or prevents other problems too, not just heart problems, and I'll leave it to you to look it up. PubMed (Medline, National Library of Medicine) is free and you can get the articles at your local library.

I guess that's why the really old people we see are so skinny. With a BMI of 19.7 (the mean in human studies), people would probably think I was 90.

2909 Speaking of photos

When I take photographs, I'm always reminding people to take off their sunglasses. Big black blobs on the face don't make for good pics unless you're a bumblebee. But in this Wordless Wednesday at Ribbiticus' site, you can see the eyes and nothing else. Makes you wonder why they even bothered or how they would know if a stranger stepped in.

2908 Rescuing old photos and diaries

When the family was cleaning out the apartment of Neno, my husband's grandmother, after her death in the 1970s there was a large box of photos that no one wanted. I glanced through it, didn't know most of the people, but grabbed it like it was gold. It is such a treasure! I just can't imagine anyone tossing old family memorabilia. And that's how Travels with Jean became a retrospective blog. It tells the travels of Jean Ritchie, a British maiden lady, a mid-wife, who traveled with her mother and sister, keeping detailed diaries illustrated with photos, postcards and trip memorabilia. After her death in the 1960s, most of her diaries were destroyed--deemed worthless by the people who settled her estate. But her sister had 3 of them, and her sister was the godmother of the person who is posting Jean's diaries on the internet so they won't be lost like the others were. Isn't that great? Stop by and take a look.

2907 Friday Family Photo

This old photo is new to me. We just got it last week while visiting my husband's family in California.



It was taken July 4, 1953 at Lake Webster, Indiana, where my husband's grandfather and aunts owned a summer cottage together. Although he rarely saw his father, the aunties made sure my husband and his sister were included in everything and they have many happy memories of summer vacations at the lake with aunts and uncles and cousins. This photo includes my husband's sister Jean (in the swim cap), his cousin Darlene, his cousin Janie Kay (daughter of cousin Alberta) sitting on his knee, and a friend Katherine Ring.

Last summer we ran into some residents of Lake Webster while we were at Lakeside. I believe they told me that it is no longer a vacation destination, but primarily an area of permanent homes.

Lake Webster, Indiana
old photographs
families
1950s