Domestic Science?

A recent study, reported at Scotsman.com News stated that "moderate housework can help women substantially to cut their risk of developing breast cancer".

It's hard enough getting help around the house. Now this?
"Oh, I'd vacuum, but I want you to reduce your risk of developing breast cancer."
"Oh, I'd do the laundry, but I don't want to be responsible for increasing the likelihood of you developing breast cancer."
"Oh, I'd dust, but..." well, maybe not that one.

The same day, The Mirror reported on the invention of the Shoover. Shoes that vacuum as you walk around wearing them. There's an idea...but does that mean the shoes get heavier as you Shoover? The dirt/dust has to go somewhere, right? Say you went to put the Shoovers away in the closet when you were finished. Wouldn't you get one heck of a shock after shuffling around the carpet vacuuming in your shoes and then touching the handle on the closet door?

On the other hand, Shoovers would make the stairs a snap to clean.

Stop Me if You've Heard This One Before

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has drafted a statement that meat and milk from cloned animals is as safe for consumption as that of conventionally reared livestock and cattle. The FDA statement is consistent with the 2002 findings of The National Academy of Sciences, an independent advisory body, that provides input on "scientific and technological issues that frequently pervade policy decisions."

According to farmers who have invested in cloning animals, the food and milk wouldn't come from the clone, but from the offspring of the clone. Currently, the FDA does not allow the sale of meat or milk from cloned animals.

Read FDA Draft Statement List of Cloned Animals

Obvious: You are What You Eat.
Subdued: Make mine a double.
More Subdued: "I repeat, cloning animals for food is safe".

Question: Can that fast-food chain still claim that No Two Burgers Are the Same?

Sometimes this stuff almost writes itself.

Other Articles on: [Animal Cloning] [Food Safety]

Espadrilles Don't Pertain to the Automobile

es-pa-drille [es-puh-dril]
- noun
Def: 1. a flat shoe with a cloth upper, a rope sole, and sometimes lacing that ties around the ankle.
2. a casual shoe, often with a wedge heel instead of a flat sole.
[Origin: 1860–65; Pr espardilho, dim. of espart]

(from Dictionary.com)

espadrille fraîche [es-puh-dril fray-sh]
- descriptive noun
Def: 1. a really cool casual shoe, often with a wedge heel and rope sole

espadrille fraîche pour ma maman
- phrase
Def: 1. a really cool shoe for my Mom

I knew all along it wasn't a car... and I found these on my own, without the dictionary or Wikipedia.

Technically, esparto is of Spanish origin. In which case, cool espadrilles would be espadrille fresco. That has a better ring to it. The style is widely agreed to hail from the south of France, so this post remains true to its material roots.

Espadrilles (Wikipedia) [Articles about Espadrilles]

The Tradition of the Nativity Scene

When I was growing up, our family had a nativity scene that was arranged atop the piano in the living room. It was a traditional scene and my Mom had painted each ceramic figure. In the first year, it was Mary, Joseph, Jesus, the manger and the Wise Men. Each year after that, she painted additional pieces to include. Every December 25th, at 12:00 a.m., we'd sing Happy Birthday and place baby Jesus in the manger.

I don't know where that nativity is now. Come to think of it, I haven't seen that manger set in several years. Yesterday, at my parents' home, I saw there was a different nativity arrangement on the table behind the couch. Except for Kashmir's interest in the new set, I might not have noticed it back there.

My parents have an acre of property that they decorate for the season. The latest in outdoor decorations is the over-sized inflatable adornment. That got me to thinking...

I found these items for sale, and thought, they'd be perfect in the orchard.
A 9 ft. inflatable scene

And to finish it off right,

add the 6' tall Wise Men...

Each has its own "self-contained illumination system" and is described as being "a highly visible lawn decoration." Both unfortunately, now sold out for the season.

Think you'd find these for sale at some blasphemous website, right? Wrong. Try CatholicSupply.com

More on [Inflatable Lawn Decorations]

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Christian Rocks

Christian C's debut public performance: Live at HT.

Who doesn't love a song from the Red Hot chilee Peppers?

Check out Christian performing Sam Roberts' Bridge to Nowhere

Not caught on video: the cell phones waved by fans marking approval.

Million Dollar Blog

Gifter.org invites you to make a wish and/or sponsor a wish.

They have initiated a campaign to collect one million wishes sponsored by one million dollars in donations made to charities around the world, hence, The Million Dollar Blog Post. Follow the instructions at the Gifter site to ensure your wish and sponsorship are included.

Here's my own humble offering to the Daily Bread Food Bank in Toronto and CanadaHelps.org.



Go ahead, make a wish... it's on me!

Thanks to Joe Summers for sending the link.

[Gifter.org] [Daily Bread Food Bank] [CanadaHelps.org]
[Million Dollar Blog]

Giving Cancer the Boot

My sister Roni has been undergoing chemotherapy as part of a continued treatment plan for breast cancer.

Roni is obsessed with boots. All kinds of boots. Boots that go to the knee or over the knee. Boots that go just to the ankle and some that rise to mid-calf. Shoes that look like boots. Spike heel. Platform. She probably even has boots without a heel. Snake skin, eel, leather, suede. Power boots. Comfort boots.

Boots. She loves boots.

To every treatment, Roni wears a different pair of boots. Technicians, oncologists and other patients notice her always remarkable boots.

Her fifth chemotherapy treatment was Thursday. Wednesday, she wrote:

My Man is AMAZING. Knowing that I'm more than a little bummed about a chemo Christmas,...he did what every good husband ought to do.

He went out and bought me a pair of killer black boots with wee spiky heels and gave them to me before Christmas so that I could wear them to my chemo treatment in the morning.

Ya' gotta' really love a man that knows the emotional value of a good pair of kick-ass leather boots.

I guess it's true, what they say - every cloud has a leather lining.

That Song Sounds a Little Flat

Last night, Jessica's hockey team completed their usual training at CIA. Normally, Jess and Rebecca are the last ones out of the dressing room. Sometimes it's Jess and Liz. This time it was Jessica and Mindy. No matter, Jess is always last out.

Coach Mark always waits until the last player is finished before he leaves. Last night, his daughter Maddy, wasn't even at the practice, and Mark still waited. Each week, Mark teases Jess about being the final player to leave. It's a bit they do.

In the parking lot, Jess was throwing her gear into the trunk. Mark was parked beside us. He backed out of his spot. At the same time, Jessica decided to pull her MP3 player and phone out of her pocket. She dropped the music player onto the laneway.

And Mark drove over it with his Jimmy. Now those music files are really compressed.

Noncompetitive Blogging

Double-blogging: (def) - the same situation recounted in two different blogs. Michelle and I need to be careful about double-blogging. Some regular readers of my blog click through to Michelle's blog. Some of hers, click over to mine. We want to keep the audiences hooked; and blogging shouldn't be a competitive sport.

We've never had a conflict. We don't need to outline definite rules. Sometimes ownership of the story is clear. But, what to do when the story is ours? Take for example, a discussion about stem cell research in China. Sisters from Port Perry, Ontario are flying to China to receive stem cell therapy to treat their spinal cord injuries. Read about the Deering sisters .

I wasn't alone in not knowing that China was a recognized leader in stem-cell therapies. I raised the issue of product piracy and the Chinese economy . Which led to a discussion around the plausibility, in the future, to counterfeit stem-cells.

Consider it. There's a market for low-cost knock-offs and imitations in toys, electronics and medicine. Illegal copies of CDs and DVDs are not hard to find. Why not progenitor cellular therapy, too?

Double Jeopardy

Wednesday. Dundas St. & Hwy. 427.
I was waiting in a double line-up of cars being stopped at a R.I.D.E. checkpoint. The Police were checking 6 cars at a time. I thought about how this was another time when it's best to have delayed running the IV in the car. This was a good time to not have a bag of medication hanging from the mirror. (Another is at the Canada-U.S. border). When it was my turn, the officer leaned into the car and asked when the last time was that I had some alcohol. There was a microsecond pause as some wise-ass answers ran through my mind. "I don't drink," I responded. "Have you had anything to drink today?" the officer asked. A nanosecond passed. I was biting my tongue. He wasn't making this easy for me. "No."

Thursday. Home after the morning drop-off.
I brought the pole/pump downstairs, prepared the solution and connected. I had just opened the newspaper when the door bell rang.

Answering the door is complicated when I'm running the IV. It is difficult to steer upon carpet. There's one step down from the hall to the door. And then there's the dog. Buddy wasn't behaving in his 'I-know-who-this-is-at-the-door'-way. I considered ignoring the doorbell. It is frustrating to go through the work to get to the door to discover it's a rep who wants to discuss fixed-rate energy price plans. Plus, I was probably going to fall asleep if I just stayed still. And that wouldn't be so bad, either.

The police officer on the porch rang the bell again. Having seen him through the window, I was glad I had at least come to check it out. I opened the door. "I'm looking for ..." he paused and flipped some papers over to find the name, "Andrew," he finished.
He looked up from the documents then and saw that I was leaning against the door to keep it open, had one leg across the bottom one-third of the opening so the dog wouldn't bolt out to chase the squirrel that was coming down the tree, and was using my other hand to pull the IV pole closer. (I had misjudged the distance between my Hickman connection and the machine and was about 3 inches too far away from the pump.) I was off-balance.

"Are you OK?" he asked.
I invited him to come inside.

Buddy made a menacing sound toward the squirrel then did his 'Did you come to play with me? Do you have any treats? Look at the tricks I do with these shoes.' routine.

Like anyone is reading this paragraph! I know you skipped ahead to find out why the police were here.

It's OK. Andrew's being called as a witness in a case that will be tried in the spring. The police officer was delivering the subpoena. But the Constable didn't get right to the point with me, so I didn't think it'd be fair for you not to experience it the same way.
Take your own reaction as you read about the police looking for Andrew, multiply it by googol, and that was what those 7 minutes were like for me.

Here's to a police-free day tomorrow!

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Fast Snacks

It's a conspicuous silence when I'm not updating the sites, sending email, or offering more than a few lines in response to an email I receive. I'm grateful to have you checking up on me. Nothing and everything is happening:

I have been suffering with symptoms of low iron for a month, which, I can track back to be almost one year, to the day, of when we started arranging iron infusions last year. Until my levels improve, my energy is low. When I stop 'doing' and pause my mind and body, I fall asleep. Never for very long, but basically, when I stop and relax, I drift off to sleep. Guess I wasn't into the conversation around the dinner table this evening...stood up, rolled the IV to the couch, laid down, went to sleep.

We are lucky to know terrific people. A couple of weeks ago, I put a call out asking friends to drive the afternoon carpool for me one day each week. Together they implemented a plan whereby Kathy, Shari, Gloria or Arlene is driving the after-school carpool for us three days each week. These guys are no slackers! Each wears the hat of Professional/Mother/Sports Fan/Daughter/Sister/Wife/Neighbor/Friend throughout her day. They've got it all under control. More proof that when something needs to be done, just ask a busy person to help out. Thank you. Really, truly.

I can sleep right through the IV Pump alarms, but the dog's snoring is pretty disrupting. Before we check him out for apnea, we've got to try a nasal strip or something!

I am beginning to notice that Christmas is approaching. No, the house isn't decorated. No, the shopping's not done. Obviously, no presents are wrapped. I do not wish to discuss Christmas baking, thank you very much. We kind of have a plan to get everything taken care of. Fourteen days can be a lot of time. Especially if we skip that whole baking thing.

Part of The Plan: John and I spent the day together to shop for Christmas. One problem: Medication did not reach the correct temperature to infuse before we left. Nature of the day was stop and go, so running it in the car wasn't going to work. Just moved ahead.
Another problem: John and I shop alike. We look for the present that you didn't know you wanted/needed. We know what we're looking for, we just need to find it. We ran into Kari and caught up a bit. We found some unique stores, but after several hours we had 2 raffle tickets, 1 gift card and something on hold at a different location. We saw a lot of the same same-ness in a hundred stores.
Shortly after we arrived at the new location, we had a bag to carry! We hunted around a little more.
Another problem: I don't need to stop to eat. I don't get hungry. My stomach doesn't growl. I was still nursing the same drink from when we left the house. I didn't deny John the opportunity to refuel...It's just that I sometimes forget that other people eat.
Unresolved problem: THE GIFT is out of stock...everywhere...across the country...I hesitated and missed the chance to scoop it online. It's gone from there, too.

Andrew has almost completed his shopping. We committed to hitting a few places in particular tonight to try to wrap it up. Andrew is a great shopper. Last year, on the Saturday before Christmas, we went to Sherway together (yes, on the Saturday before The Big Day) and, using his eagle-eye, we quickly found everything we were looking for (and you didn't know you wanted).

It's a two-part process to subscribe to this blog. You enter your email address in the box in the sidebar, verify the letters on the screen and then a confirmation email is sent to you. The reader clicks the link in the email and Presto! You're in. My Mom hasn't confirmed her subscription...I'm going to need therapy.

Speaking of...my Mom, not therapy...We spent yesterday together. She stopped me as I was about to get into her car. "Wait. The phone," she said, referring to her Nokia 2100 floor-mounted car phone, circa 1987. "It interferes with your pacemaker."
"Ma! I don't have the pacemaker anymore, remember?"

We think we'll survive without the ooey-chewy-double-chocolate cookies we make each year, but are we ready to give up the fudge?

Make fudge or take up knitting? Fudge.

It...Is...Alive

I did it!
I followed the instructions about climatizing and soil that Lori gave me and it paid off.

We all had doubts. For more than a week it didn't look like the plant would survive and I endured some hefty teasing. This is the fourth flower, and there are plenty more to follow.

This Hibiscus: Hardy to Zone Chris.