New Parenting Method

I know many people want to stay current with the latest parenting trends -- attachment parenting, minimalist parenting, Tiger Mother parenting, et al. Well, I've stumbled upon a new technique that will guarantee your child grows up to be an exemplary student and citizen. It's called CTFD, which stands for "Calm The F*ck Down." And that's not a message to give your kids. It's for you.

Using CTFD assures you that -- whichever way you choose to parent -- your child will be fine (as long as you don't abuse them, of course). To see it in action, here are some sample parenting scenarios and how CTFD can be employed: 

Worried your friend's child has mastered the alphabet quicker than your child? Calm the f*ck down.

Scared you're not imparting the wisdom your child will need to survive in school and beyond? Calm the f*ck down.

Concerned that you're not the type of parent you thought you'd be? Calm the f*ck down.

Upset that your child doesn't show interest in certain areas of learning? Calm the f*ck down.

Stressed that your child exhibits behavior in public you find embarrassing? Calm the f*ck down.

Yes, using the CTFD method, you'll find the pressure lifted and realize your child loves you no matter what, even if they've yet to master the alphabet. You'll also learn that whether or not you're the best parent in the world, as long as you love your child, they'll think you are and that's what matters. Plus, CTFD makes you immune to those that prey upon the fears of new parents, like pseudoscientists and parenting authors.

To use CTFD, just follow these simple steps:

Calm the f*ck down.

There is no second step.

So, ignore all those other parenting trends and stick to CTFD. You'll be glad you did and so will your kid.

This post originally appeared -- without the asterisks -- on TheDaddyComplex.com.

Success is so sweet!

Success is sweet!  A friend of my grandson's is staying with us until he finds a job and can get his own place to live.  When we typed up his resume, I found out that while he was living in New Mexico he didn't graduate from high school.  Well! Anyone in my family can tell you that news like that just kicks me into high gear.  

I found that the library in Chandler offered GED tutoring and that the test was going to be given on August 24th.  He went to the library and got all the info, he registered online, and I loaned him the money to pay the fee.  He took the test last Saturday and tonight he got his results.  He passed with flying colors! 

What a satisfying feeling, knowing that I helped give him something that will help him from now on.

Aljazeera Whaaat?

I can't wait to see what the " new voice" of news in America has to say. We watched our first segment of Aljazeera America last night and I must say I was impressed.  Ever since the school massacre in Newtown, there have been very few investigative stories that focus on the proliferation of gun violence in our country.  Aljazeera apparently owes no debt to the NRA and is not afraid to shine a light on the number of shootings taking place in Chicago.  The first segment was last night, and the second is tonight.  The veteran newswoman, Joie Chan, is excellent, as is every other journalist I have seen on this network.  One of my favorites is Ali Velchi who I have previously watched on anorher network.

Here are the names of the editorial team for Aljazeera.  Relax, none of them are named Mohammed!

The editorial team will be led by Kate O'Brian, a 30-year ABC News veteran who will take over as president of the network.

She will be joined by David Doss and Shannon High-Bassalik, who will join from CNN as senior vice-presidents, and Marcy McGinnis, a former journalism associate dean who worked at CBS News.

Ehab al-Shihabi will serve as interim chief executive officer of the network, according to an announcement made by Al Jazeera's acting director-general, Mostefa Souag.

Q&A

Five Questions with Kate O'Brian, Al Jazeera America's newly

appointed president:

 Why Al Jazeera? 

This is an incredibly exciting opportunity to create a news product that I think is sorely missing in the American media landscape right now. There is a great history of quality journalism at Al Jazeera, and I am looking forward to bringing all that to Al Jazeera America. 

O'Brian, a former senior vice-president at ABC News who began her career there as an intern, will be based at the network's headquarters in New York City, and "will have full responsibility for defining and implementing the editorial strategy and operations across the network, including news, documentary and all other programming", according to the statement.

In an interview, O'Brian told Al Jazeera English, AJAM's sister network, that there was "a gap" in the US news media landscape that her channel would be seeking to fill.

"Coming into the American news landscape, the opportunity to innovate is something Al Jazeera can bring into the equation. We can start from scratch, producing in-depth, quality content for the viewers who are looking for something different. It will be a new product, not incremental tweaks in existing news formats," she said.

Al-Shihabi said at the end of June that Al Jazeera had hired 650 employees and planned to air 8 minutes of commercials per hour, which is below the industry standard of about 15 minutes.

Interestingly, the channel that the network purchased, Current TV, was sold to Aljazeera by none other than that great American, Al Gore.

Nothing Lasts Forever

As the grandmother of five (seven if you count the two we have taken care of since they were infants) I get lots of phone calls from parents who need to vent.  With one grandson now out of his teenage years, and two who are in the throes of that challenging time, I can recognize good advice when I see it.  Michael L. Stoller, LCSW, lists the common sense suggestions that will help any parent survive and even keep enjoying their teenagers.  Wherever Stoller says "your son," you can substitute "your daughter."

Respect your son’s integrity and his authority over his own life.

Have faith that whatever you want to tell your son, you have told him already and he will remember it when the time comes.

Offer help with an open hand.

Try offering help in the form of a question.  “Would you like…?” or “How can I help?”

Be responsible and manage your own helplessness and fear without imposing it on him.

Never offer advice without asking permission first.

Tell your son “I love you. I am proud of you. I know you have what it takes. You are a wild man.”  Do this thousands different ways.

Be around not only physically, but also emotionally.

Walk your talk (i.e. if you want your son to be healthier, look at how you are taking care of your own health).

Be vulnerable.  Share some of your fears, worries, and uncertainties with him.

Admit when you are wrong and apologize frequently.

Be selfish.  Fill yourself up first prior to giving yourself away.

Always be cool and calm in the face of his distress, anger, or sadness.

Listen to your son even if he is yelling at you.

Say as little as possible in order to get your son to say as much as possible.

Use “I” statements.  Talk more about your feelings than his behavior.

Gauge your son’s mood prior to having tough conversations.

Drop everything you are doing if your son wants to talk to you.  This opportunity does not come frequently.

Let go of your pride (i.e. you don’t need to have the last word).

Focus on the 90% he is doing well instead of the 10% he is not.

THIS TIME WILL PASS! He won’t be a teenager forever.

Ammonia hydroxide for lunch, anyone?

On Facebook today a friend posted a story that would make you puke up your lunch - especially if that lunch was a Big Mac.  The story told of the chef, Jamie Oliver's ongoing battle with Macdonald's and their practice of using "pink slime" in their burgers.

According to the FB account, the fatty parts of beef are “washed” in ammonium hydroxide and used in the filling of the burger. Before this process, according to Oliver, the food is deemed unfit for human consumption.

 “Basically, we’re taking a product that would be sold in the cheapest way for dogs, and after this process, is being given to human beings.”

Besides the low quality of the meat, the ammonium hydroxide is harmful to health. Oliver calls it “the pink slime process.”

“Why would any sensible human being put meat filled with ammonia in the mouths of their children?” asked the chef, who wages a war against the fast food industry.

To be fair, a response was published in Beef Daily on August 13, 2013.  

Here is part of the article by Amanda Radke:

"It’s been more than a year since the industry was “pink-slimed,” a term coined by ABC News anchor Diane Sawyer and British food blogger Jamie Oliver. The term, of course, was the sensational characterization of lean finely textured beef (LFTB). LFTB is a 100% beef product produced by a process developed by Beef Products Inc. (BPI) of Dakota Dunes, SD, which separates fat from lean in beef trim. Until the sensational ABC News expose, LFTB was commonly used as an ingredient in school lunch programs and fast-food burgers. The fact is that billions of pounds of the product have been produced and consumed over the years without any reported problems.

The news report, and the resulting social media campaign, created such a hysteria that demand for LFTB dried up, and BPI was forced to close three of its four LFTB plants and lay off 650 employees. BPI then sued ABC News and others for defamation, and that case continues. But the nasty connotation in consumers' minds that beef is tainted with chemicals persists.

In fact, that notion is being perpetuated by Oliver’s most recent musings. His war against the fast-food industry has been largely aimed at McDonald’s, which announced earlier this year that the chain will revise its burger recipe to exclude LFTB."

So, shining a light on the fast food industry did have an effect.  Maybe more parents will weigh the convenience of the Macdonald's drive-through against the idea that they really don't know what's in that food they are buying for their little soccer players.

The food scientists are busy in their labs right now trying to come up with some other process, just as gross, to increase their profits.  

Rolletes for Dinner?

A few weeks ago I wrote about the food giants and what they have done to the food we eat.  In a totally unrelated book, The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson, I found another story in that same vein...

In an article appearing in Time magazine in 1959, it was said that Charles Mortimer, then chairman of General Foods, became frustrated by the same old, same old vegetables and put his best scientists to work to create some new ones. (No one can say he didn't have lofty ambitions!)

These kitchen wizards came up with "Rolletes," a product in which they pureed multiple vegetables-peas, carrots, and lima beans, for example-then formed the mush into frozen sticks.  Mom could then simply place them on a baking tray and warm them up in the oven.

The article didn't say whether or not the Rolletes would turn back into mush when heated.

Does anyone remember such a product?

God Took Her Eye Off the Ball

Be careful what you wish for, the old adage goes. An Arizona family that was fed up with government control in the U.S., decided to sail away and "see where God led us." God allowed a series of storms to damage their boat and leave them adrift. But then God provided a Venezuelan fishing boat to rescue them. Perhaps God was dropping a hint that she wanted them to go to Venezuela, but they didn't think much of that idea, apparently.

 They were transferred to a Japanese cargo ship where they spent three weeks before being taken to Chile. Good thing God speaks Japanese, huh? The family was on a flight back to Arizona arranged by the bad old US Embassy. Mom said they will go back to Arizona and come up with a new plan." I guess the plan is to give God another chance since the first one didn't work out too well.

Good News on the Obesity Front

You know the saying about how you never see Volkswagen "Bugs" until you start shopping for one, and then they seem to be everywhere you look?  Well, I had that experience when I started blogging about the book Salt, Sugar and Fat, and Americ"
a's obesity problem.  Suddenly, I saw articles about obesity everywhere!  The good news is that we may be turning those statistics around.

Sabrina Tavernise, reporting for The New York Times, tells us that obesity rates for pre-school age children from poor families dropped in 19 states from 2008 to 2011, although they remained unchanged in my state of Arizona.

One of the causes of the slowdown in obesity rates may be that breast-feeding has been encouraged.  Also, the mothers of those pre- schoolers may be poor, but they are more educated than in the past, and they want their children to be healthier adults than their grandparents were.

Why Is Having Dental Work Done Such Torture?

After not going to a dentist for years, due to personal dread and the high cost, I finally made an appointment with the local dental school in Mesa.  The first few visits were wonderful.  I could not have been more impressed.  The visits are long since the students are being extremely thorough and careful, checking and double-checking every entry on the computer.  Then a professor comes over and pretty much repeats what the student has done. So, count on 3 hours instead of the one hour you. usually spend at the dentist.  But I learned more about my mouth than I had in my previous 70 years! I completely understood what needed to be done and why.  At least this time I didn't feel like maybe the dentist said I needed that crown for $700 because it was time to make a payment on his cabin in the White Mountains!

I went twice, once for soft tissue investigation, and once for hard surface examination, and then the third visit was to go over a treatment plan and to make a mold of my mouth in case I opt for a partial on the bottom.  The total charge for all this was $69.00.

The first item on the treatment plan was deep cleaning.  You know, the kind where they go under the gums and scrape the crap off the roots.  I really don't know what happened to make this so frickin' miserable, but I don't know if I can go back for the second quadrant.  First, they used lidocaine instead of novocaine.  Every other time I have been numbed up, the dentist would stick the needle in and it was kind of painful, but it was over quick.  Not this time.  The professor was right there, telling Milen just where to put the needle, and telling him to "deposit" slowly, slowly.  Oh my God, it was torture!  It seemed like he had that needle in there at least 5 minutes.  And that was just the first of three!  And, to make matters worse,  it wasn't really that effective.  It was completely worn off by the time he was done.  I wasn't a very good patient after that, I'm afraid.

By the time the cleaning was completed (on that one quadrant) my arms were quivering from gripping the arms of the chair with a death grip, my whole mouth was throbbing, and I was pissed because the technology hasn't improved since I was 10 years old.

Why is it still so awful?  I don't know if I will go back or just let my teeth fall out!

Most Decisions Don't Require a Lot of Thought

So, after two weeks of reading Salt, Sugar, Fat, what did I learn?  I learned that, indeed, the Food Giants have hooked us, and they aren't about to turn loose.  It is a problem we have created with our economic system, actually.  These are corporations, their stock is traded on the stock exchange, you may even own stock in some of them.  Their job is to sell product.  Their mission is to increase profits every quarter.  The only way to do that is to sell more and more, expand their lines, decrease their costs.  Unless the government steps in and regulates food as it does drugs, the corporations won't - can't - change their ways.  And the members of Congress who have to vote to institute regulations don't want to lose their jobs, so they won't do it.

It's up to each and every one of us.  We have to read labels, be willing to cook more meals ourselves, not depend on processed food for our total nutrition.  And we especially need to stay away from the fast food joints.  If we can manage to stop buying enough of the food that's stuffed with salt, sugar and fat, then those corporations will switch to healthy products or die.  After all, enough people stopped smoking to hurt Philip Morris.  That's one of the reasons PM bought the food companies!  It's time to do it again.

If you can't change your habits for yourself, then do it for your kids.  Do you really want your son or daughter to have Type II diabetes by the time they are 40?  Well, believe me, those Food Giants do not care.  A corporation has no conscience.

Good Eating!

Old Macdonald Has Too Many Antibiotics

A story written by Sabrina Tavernise that appeared in the New York Times on July 30, 2013, reports on a study being conducted in Flagstaff, Arizona to determine how many people in one American city are getting urinary infections from meat from the grocery store.

Lance Price, a microbiologist at George Washington University has done his research on antibiotics at the Translational Genomics Research Institute in Phoenix.  Dr. Price has been sounding the alarm about antibiotic resistance for a number of years.  He recently told a Congressional committee that evidence of the ill effects of antibiotics in farming was overwhelming.

He thinks the FDA's efforts to limit antibiotic use on farms have been weak.  In 1977 (36 years ago!) the FDA said it would begin to ban some agricultural uses of antibiotics.  But the House and Senate appropriations committees - dominated by agricultural interests - passed resolutions against the ban, and the FDA retreated.  Surprise, surprise.

David White, Ph.D., is the chief science officer in FDA’s Office of Food and Veterinary Medicine.  The following is a quote from the FDA article titled "Fighting the Impact of Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria."

The fundamental concern over the agricultural use of antibiotics arises from the potential that resistant bacterial strains can be transferred to humans via direct contact, or ingestion of food derived from treated animals. This is a legitimate concern as epidemiological and microbiological data show that resistant bacteria from food animals can reach humans via the food supply. And most classes of antimicrobials used in animals have human counterparts. Therefore, resistance to an animal drug might translate into resistance to a human drug.

Antibiotics are given to animals for various reasons, including: 1) treatment of sick animals; 2) prevention of illness in healthy animals; and 3) control of disease in a group of animals when some in the group show overt signs of disease.

Antibiotics are also used to improve feed efficiency and weight gain in healthy animals, a practice the FDA has been working to change. In 2012, FDA released a guidance document for the animal health and animal agriculture industries that focuses on two primary principles: 1) limiting medically important antimicrobial drugs to uses in food-producing animals that are considered necessary for assuring animal health; and 2) limiting such drugs to uses in food-producing animals that include veterinary oversight or consultation. We think that this voluntary approach will move us forward in the quickest way possible, and it doesn't rule out future regulation.

Another example of how our government cares more about protecting the providers of food than the consumers of food.  Apparently, the FDA, after decades of studies showing that eating meat from animals fed antibiotics is a factor in antibiotic resistance, still feels that "voluntary" compliance is the way to go.

Do As I Say, Not As I Do

Interviews of former executives of the food giants reveal that, since retirement, most of them have an entirely different view of the products they once sold.  One, upon visiting his doctor and discovering that the cartilage in his knee was pretty much gone, decided that he would have to start managing his weight with diet instead of exercise.  As he roamed the aisles of his grocery store, he said, "Can't eat this, can't eat that."  And, predictably, he began saying, "We shouldn't sell this, we shouldn't sell that."

Another story involved a man who had spent his entire working life on developing Lunchables.  His family had grown up eating the prepared lunches and were proud of their Dad for inventing such a popular food item.  When his daughter graduated from college and went to her new job for the first time, she proudly showed up with her bright yellow packaged Lunchable.  The first remark she heard was, "Oh my God, don't you know what those things do to a landfill! And all those nitrites in that ham!"  

Working for the "corporate cookers" is like living in an ivory tower.  You become so dedicated to selling more and more and more that you lose track of the fact that real people are buying, eating and disposing of those products.

Now They Are Killing Us With Food

Why can't we solve the problem of obesity in the U.S? Michael Moss, in his book, "Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us" tells us, in no uncertain terms, why our government will not help, and, in fact, is complicit in making this epidemic worse.  By focusing on the three things that make food most appealing, Moss shows us how the giant corporations who control our food supply have made it nearly impossible to have a healthy diet.  

"The transition of food to being an industrial product really has been a fundamental problem," according to Walter Willett, the chair of Harvard's Department of Nutrition.  "First, the actual processing has stripped away the nutritional value of the food.  Most of the grains have been converted to starches.  We have sugar in concentrated form, and many of the fats have been concentrated and then, worst of all, hydrogenated, which creates transfatty acids with very adverse effects on health."

"Kelly Brownell, a Yale professor of psychology and public health, says, 'As a culture, we've become upset by the tobacco companies advertising to children, but we sit idly by while the food companies (owned by the tobacco companies) do the very same thing.  And we could make a claim that the toll taken on the public health by a poor diet rivals that taken by tobacco.'"

One of the most important factors in my giving up cigarettes was watching the government grilling of the 7 heads of the biggest tobacco companies and seeing them sit there and tell lie after lie.  They all innocently claimed they had no idea that smoking was harmful!  At that moment, I swore I would never again give a dime of my money to those lying bastards. And I thought that I hadn't given any more money to them.  I was wrong.

Not satisfied with killing people with cigarettes, Philip Morris acquired General Foods and Kraft.  Now it could kill people with fat and sugar - it would just take a bit longer.  But that was all right because the longer people lived, and the fatter they got, the more money Philip Morris would make.  Moss says, "By 1990, Philip Morris had all but cornered the market for cigarettes.  With the purchase of General Foods and Kraft, it had also become a consumer goods goliath, posting $3.5 billion in annual profits on $51.2 billion in sales.  Half of its revenue came from food."

So now I swear again that I will never give those liars another dime of my money.  Here is a short list of products I bet you didn't know were made by the same folks that brought you Marlboro cigarettes: 

Capri Sun juice boxes

Jell-O

Kraft Singles

Maxwell House

Oscar Meyer 

Philadelphia (cream cheese)

Velvetta

Cadbury

Next entry, I will talk about why each of those products should be labelled as "dangerous to your health."

You've Got to Read

Short post:  Go out TODAY and get a copy of "Salt, Sugar, and Fat," by Michael Moss.  Trust me.

The next thing to do is take a look at sugarstackers.com.  You will be surprised, I guarantee you.

Let's Ignore Those Idiots in Washington

 Last April my daughter and I toured China for 10 days.  We were both somewhat ignorant and suffering from what turned out to be incorrect assumptions about the Chinese people and the culture.  Having grown up during the Cold War, I fully expected to see "coolies" dressed in black pajamas and pulling a rickshaw.  So wrong.  Here's a photo of a typical young Chinese woman.

 

Doesn't she look Western?  Or look at this photo - would you believe this is a communist country?  

Never did I think that we would be able to wander freely as we did.  We went shopping, ate in a Pizza Hut, browsed through the Shanghai Art Museum, all without chaperones.

Our tour guides surprised us by talking about all the changes in their lifetimes in their country.  No question went unanswered by Sam or Allen.  The only warning we were ever given was prior to our visit to Tiananmen Square where the massacre took place in 1989.  We were told not to discuss what happened that June among ourselves, that there were undercover police alert to any mention of what the government has never acknowledged took place.

All of the people we spoke with were proud of their country, but not necessarily of their government.  Here in the U.S. more than a year later, I see many similarities in the attitudes of the Chinese and the Americans. Are you starting to lose interest in the childish behavior of our elected officials?  Do you think they are truly representing your interests, or their own?

Please comment and tell us what you think would happen if we all just went about our business paying no attention to the government.  In China, because they do not have elections, the people feel little or no connection to, or responsibility for, what their government does.  Of course, I am not suggesting that what the government does has no effect on the citizenry, but, believe me, I saw people far happier than you would expect them to be living under a Communist regime.

Is it possible that what Wall Street does affects our lives more than what Washington does?  Can we boycott Washington?  What if we hold an election and nobody votes?  But - and this is a big but (ha) - what if we only shop at businesses who support Gun Sense? What if we agree to ONLY buy products made in America? Are you making McDonalds richer by making yourself fatter? Well, stop.  I could go on and on, and you probably can, too.

What do you think?

God at 17,000 feet

A friend of mine recently watched a You Tube video about the Argus surveillance system that can be attached to a "drone" and can capture high resolution images from 17,000 feet.  Not only can it capture these images, it can zoom in on a specific area and show you what is happening on the ground in real time.  Once captured, the images can be stored and be available for recall in the future.

My friend was outraged.  The idea that some "eye in the sky" could record him walking to work from the subway seemed to threaten his sense of security.  The idea, however, that Argus could possibly have recorded the movements of the two brothers who placed the bombs in Boston and helped identify them, apparently did not occur to him.Since this friend was born and raised and educated in the Catholic church, I asked him how the Argus differed from the understanding most Christians have of God.  Doesn't God watch everything that happens on Earth?  Doesn't God see what each and every one of us does 24/7?  And doesn't He remember for eternity whether we have been good Christians or evil sinners?

 Why does one Almighty Eye cause outrage and the other (who supposedly has the power to strike you dead on the spot without a trial) deserve your worship?

We Are Killing Our Kids!

The children were pressed up against the glass in the Gorilla house, amazed at the size of the great silver-back inches away.  This particular primate was in excellent health, with a glistening coat and sparkling eyes that occasionally looked right back at the children.

I could not help but compare one primate to another.  The gorilla was happily munching on a head of lettuce, but there was no lettuce in any form (except maybe a leaf on a cheeseburger) available for the homo sapiens there to eat.  The homo sapiens specimens were almost all overweight, whether they were young or old.  

The gorillas were fed the diet that they were designed to eat; fruits and vegetables.  None of the animals on one side of the glass were obese.  Many of the ones on the other side of the glass were.  Which ones will live longer?

Who, Me?

Everything you do is based on the choices you make. It's not your parents, your past relationships, your job, the economy, the weather, an argument or your age that is to blame.  You and only you are responsible for every decision and choice you make.

                                            

                                                                        Period.

My Last Playlist

Not long ago our daughter approached my 73 year old husband with a question.  She was very hesitant and asked him not to be upset with her, but then asked, "What kind of music do you want at your funeral?"  Somewhat taken aback he started thinking about it.  And since then, so have I.

I decided that I should make "My Last Playlist."  Maybe you want to start creating yours, too.  So far I only have five songs in my playlist, but it's a start.  

The first is Key Largo by Bertie Higgins.  This is "our song" for Ron and me.  The wonderful old motor sailer that we spent so many happy hours on was named "Key Largo", and we just have to hear this song to wisk away the past 30 years.

The second is a song by John Denver called "Matthew."  When Steve and Kathy were little and we were living on the ranch in Alzada, we had a car with the old-fashioned tape player.  We had only one tape for a long time, and it was one of John Denver's. For some reason that I never figured out, the song titled "Matthew" touched something in me, and i would be driving our road going to pick the kids up at school, or something, with tears streaming down my face.  Ever have that happen to you?

A new song that I added is Titanium by The Piano Guys.  I just love their music.  It is a beautiful blend of classical with some of the most popular songs of today.

Fourth on my playlist is "American Pie" by the great Don Maclean.  One of the best songs ever written, in my opinion, deserves to be on everyone's favorite playlist.

Phil Collins recorded the theme song for a popular television show called Miami Vice.  One summer I played it over and over as we cruised the Chesapeake Bay on Key.  I was in love and hope and poassibility were "In The Air Tonight."

As I add songs to my last playlist, I will post them to this blog.

Can I Be Myself?

I have just finished reading Andrew McCarthy's book, The Longest Way Home, and it has made me want to examine my life - my feelings, my thoughts, my belief system - rather than continue to make decisions based on someone else's beliefs.  Too often I make a choice based on the cost of something.  Living with DH for so long has installed in my brain a calculator that instantly knows when something is too costly, not in my opinion, but in his.  He doesnt even have to be present.

Here are some simple examples: we were at Lowe's and I saw a new product: a sports towel that when wet stays cool and keeps you cool. Since I have always had a problem with sweating rivers when it's hot, my friend said "buy it," but it was $14.99 and I knew that DH would say, why do you need that? He would say that any hand towel would do just as well.  So I didn't buy it.  Now, after reading Andrew's book, I am ready to be myself and decide things based on what I think, what I feel, rather than just avoiding DH's judgment and criticism.

Another example is "The Chair."  For twenty years I have wanted a really super comfortable overstuffed armchair.  I just have visions of sitting in such a chair, maybe with a slipcover, reading Anne of Green Gables to my granddaughters.  And not long ago I saw "the chair" on an episode of "Big Bang Theory." It was perfect.  So I started shopping online.  Without a time-consuming search I found one at Macy's.  It costs $700.  DH wants to buy all our furniture at Goodwill.  He would sit on a pillow on the floor rather than spend more than $50 for any piece of furniture.  All these years I have lived with those constraints.  But no more.  I intend to buy my chair.  

Co-Sleeping - Is It for You?

Did a little boy a great favor today at the park.  I was there with my two little charges - one who will soon by 5 and one who is 3 1/2.  This little boy's dad was happy that we showed up because his son, Carter, is an only child and they like for him to have interaction with other children.  He is four, so right in between my two.   Dad started a conversation with me, and we chatted about kids of that age and found that they were all in pre-school part time.  Got around to the fact that Carter won't sleep in his own bed at night.  I told his Dad that it was only natural for babies to want the protection of their parents at night. Other species don't leave their children unguarded and vulnerable.  If an infant of another species gets lost and finds itself alone, it howls and howls until Mama comes to fetch it home.  Humans are the only stupid ones.  The conflict comes when Dad wants Mom all to himself.  In other countries the family sleeps  together and I guess the kids just know about sex.

Here is a quote from Wikipedia on the subject:

One study reported mothers getting more sleep by co-sleeping and breastfeeding than by other arrangements.

It has been argued that co-sleeping evolved over five million years, that it alters the infant's sleep experience and the number of maternal inspections of the infant, and that it provides a beginning point for considering possibly unconventional ways of helping reduce the risk of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS).

Stress hormones are lower in mothers and babies who co-sleep, specifically the balance of the stress hormone cortisol, the control of which is essential for a baby's healthy growth.

In studies with animals, infants who stayed close to their mothers had higher levels of growth hormones and enzymes necessary for brain and heart growth.

The physiology of co-sleeping babies is more stable, including more stable temperatures, more regular heart rhythms, and fewer long pauses in breathing than babies who sleep alone.

Co-sleeping may promote long-term emotional health. In long-term follow-up studies of infants who slept with their parents and those who slept alone, the children who co-slept were happier, less anxious, had higher self-esteem, were less likely to be afraid of sleep, had fewer behavioral problems, tended to be more comfortable with intimacy, and were generally more independent as adults.

However, a recent study (see below under precautions) found different results if co-sleeping was initiated only after nighttime awakenings. Co-sleeping from birth or soon afterwards is the norm except in some Western cultures.

I hope that my assurances that he was not "spoiling" his son, nor was he keeping him a baby, helped that Dad have more confidence in his and the mother's decisions to let Carter sleep with them if he needs to.  He will outgrow that need just as the young of every other species do.

Things I Learned the Hard Way

Things I Learned the Hard Way

Do not ever criticize your teenager in front of anyone.  Do it in private if it is something important.

Do not speak to your teenager in a tone that you don't want to hear coming back at you.  

Earn your child's respect, don't demand it.

If you are a father, make sure you teach your child life skills like how to change a tire, make simple repairs around the house, how to do laundry (lights and darks), what to do when the lights go out, how to treat the opposite sex, and, if you live in Arizona, how to take care of a pool.

If you are a mother, teach your child how to prepare one meal including appetizer and dessert, how to clean a bathroom, how to wrap a present, and how to manage money.

Of course this sounds sexist.  I am sorry, but I am old now and just trying to get the point across.

Have minimum standards but enforce them absolutely.  No, you may not go out in that shirt with "I Love Boobies" on it.  I don't care if it is from the Galapagos.

What you say to a teenager doesn't matter nearly as much as what you do.

Don't be a hypocrite.  Don't tell your teenager not to smoke while you burn through a pack a day.  Don't expect your teen to stay away from drugs if you have a beer the minute you get home from work.  

I am sure I will come up with lots more - stay tuned.

What does God's voice sound like?

Kudos to Aaron Sorkin for writing an amazing rant for the character of Maggie on the HBO series Newsroom.  If you haven't caught any of the episodes, watch for HBO to run it again and be sure you don't miss a single line of this well-written script.

In this episode, the staff is rehearsing possible questions for potential Republican candidates if their network is awarded the presidential debate.  Maggie's suggestion for a question for Michelle Bachman is "What does God's voice sound like?" She convinces the staff that she is serious by pointing out that if Bachman is being truthful when she says that God told her to run for President, then she is a prophet and we should pay attention to everything she says.
 

And, of course, if she cannot answer the question, then she is not telling the truth and no one should vote for someone who lies to the American people. In response to criticism that the news anchor could not denigrate Christians in such a way, Maggie responds that she is standing up for herself, her family, her church and her congregation by revealing this "false prophet."


You may say that Aaron Sorkin is simply one of the liberals that run the media and television and so, of course he is going to get his punches in against the conservative Bachman supporters.  But the important question here is "What DOES God's voice sound like?" Would you want your news anchor to ask such questions of candidates and hold their feet to the fire of public scrutiny?


Does anyone out there remember Ross Perot?  In 1992, 20 years ago, he gained a following by talking to voters as if he believed they could actually understand the issues.  I remember because it made such an impression on me.  He went on national television and for one half hour did a presentation that now would be done with Power Point, but he used charts and an old-fashioned pointer to explain in clear language what his economic policy was. He advocated a novel idea: that we do away with Medicare and Social Security for "those who don't need it." those like Warren Buffet, no doubt.  Twenty years and we are still having the same conversation!

Pissed Off by Political Ad

I just saw an Obama ad on TV that really pissed me off.  And it started out with the old "I am Barack Obama and I approved this ad" so you can't say he didn't know about it.  This ad was focused on Mitt Romney's tax rate.  It should be illegal to make statements like that without explaining that Romney, along with Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, and tons of other wealthy people pay low tax rates because most of their income is from long-term capital gains which is taxed at a lower rate FOR EVERYONE!

All you have to do is google: Why does Mitt Romney pay a lower tax rate than most?  Here's what comes up.

"Romney released his 2010 tax return in January after intense pressure, showing that he paid a 13.9 percent effective rate on $42.5 million in income. His tax rate, lower than that paid by most middle-class filers, was because most of his income came from investments."

Here is a quote from the Tucson Sentinel:

"Robert Farley

Factcheck.org

A new ad from the Obama campaign claims that Mitt Romney "paid only 14 percent in taxes—probably less than you." That depends. Romney paid a federal income tax rate that is higher than the income tax rate paid by 97 percent of tax filers. But if you include a combination of income taxes and payroll taxes — which make up the bulk of federal taxes for most taxpayers — the ad is accurate.

The ad, called "Stretch," is the first to feature a report from the Tax Policy Center that concluded a plan like Romney's proposal for across-the-board tax cuts, together with the goal of remaining revenue neutral, would ultimately raise taxes on people making less than $200,000 a year. The ad contrasts those findings with data from Romney's 2010 tax return.

The ad begins with a narrator stating, "You work hard, stretch every penny, but chances are you pay a higher tax rate than him: Mitt Romney made $20 million dollars in 2010, but paid only 14 percent in taxes—probably less than you."

I hope that what people come away with after watching this ad is that they need to learn more about investing their money so that one day their entire income can consist of capital gains and they, too, can pay a lower tax rate.  

Problem

I am using my new iPad on this trip and I can write posts just fine, but I cannot upload an image. The place that says "choose image" is grayed out. Does anyone have a clue what I am doing wrong?

Beijing

Last stop, Beijing, known in my childhood as Peking.  The name for the city has changed, but not the name for the famous dish, Peking Duck.  I loved Beijing.  It is like other international cities - lots of fabulous shopping, great museums, crazy traffic, a sense that life is moving forward.  Friendly Planet had a lot planned for us to see, and since Sam, our guide, lives in Beijing, he was also our local guide.

One of our first stops was the Forbidden City, with its 9,999 rooms.  When we returned home, I watched "The Last Emperor," the story of Pu Li, the last emperor to live in the Forbidden City.  The story made the Forbidden City come alive for me, since when we saw it, the only people inhabiting the city were tourists - mostly Chinese.  If I were to go back, I would like to have time to sign up for a tour with a guide that would show me more than we were able to explore in our short visit.  I am looking for a video tour of the Forbidden City, so if anyone comes across one, let me know.

Also that day we saw Tian'an Men Square, the site of Chairman Mao's Mausoleum.  His embalmed body is on display mornings and afternoons, but we did not have time to go through the line waiting to pay their respects.  What I did not expect was the size of the square.  We were supposed to walk from one end of the square to the focal point, the Gate of Heavenly Peace where the portrait of Mao hangs and have our group portrait taken.  Some of the wussy members of our group refused to walk that distance because of the cold and the wind whipping across the expanse of the square.  Sam quickly adjusted to the desires of the group and arranged for our picture to be made in front of the Hall of the People, only halfway across the square.  This was the only time that there was any indication that we were in a communist country.  Sam had instructed us not to have conversations about the 1989 Massacre.  He said there were undercover police in the square and we could find ourselves in trouble if they overheard us talking about something that, officially, never happened.  The government's position is that the tragedy of the student demonstrations was simply a media event.  That the press "made it all up."

In his book, Oracle Bones, Peter Hessler describes his visit to Tian'An Men Square.

          "After a while, I began to notice that some people in the crowd didn't look like tourists.  They were men, usually in their thirties and forties, and many of them had crew cuts.  They were not well dressed: worn trousers, cheap windbreakers.  They did not look educated.  They did not look like they were enjoying themselves - they weren't smiling, or taking pictures, or buying souvenirs.  They loitered and lingered; they lurked and looked.  They dawdled.  Sometimes, a man would stand directly behind a group of talking tourists, as if trying to overhear their conversation.  Periodically, one of the crew-cut men sauntered over to another crew-cut man, said something, and then sauntered away.  Several held rolled up newspapers.  I saw one man raise his newspaper, hold it next to his face, and speak to it.  Curious, I walked past and took a furtive look.  Inside the rolled paper, I caught a glimpse of black plastic - walkie-talkie." (p. 59)

The following day we went to Badaling, 44 miles northwest of Beijing, to view the Great Wall.  Compare the photo from my climb on the wall to other pictures you've seen in magazines and brochures.  They generally show two or four people walking some distance in front of the camera.  That is not what I saw.

While in Beijing we saw a Jade Factory and a Pearl Factory, both of which were interesting because, I very rarely, if ever, have seen any product being made in the U.S.  What about you?  Have you visited factories in your hometown or on any of your travels to see how different products are made?  That is something we need to institute in our country and let people be proud of things that are "made in America."

Other sites included in our tour of Beijing were the Ming Tombs and the Temple of Heaven.  There is so much history in China, a four-year degree would barely enable you to learn about all that we saw.  A favorite excursion was the Hutong tour via rickshaws.  Though Beijing is a modern city, a visit to the alleyways shows the charm of old Beijing.   The hutongs, created by the walls of courtyard houses, were the residences of officials and the well-to-do, although now most are state-owned. Our rickshaws wove in and out of narrow streets, revealing shops of every description, restaurants, bars, and houses.  Suddenly we came upon an open space beside a lake where people were walking their children and their dogs, cruising in paddle boats, and enjoying an ice cream on this leisurely afternoon.  I could have stayed the whole day there just soaking up the feeling of actually being in the middle of a place I've dreamed about since I was a child and watched my mother read Pearl S. Buck's books about China.  She looked so enraptured, I wanted to feel that way.

The grounds around the Temple of Heaven are a gathering place for people to exercise, to play mahjong or other games, and to just hang out with their friends.  I shot a video of people line dancing and one of several men passing a ball around with a racquet, never letting the ball leave their racquet until they gracefully tossed it to their partner.  There were, again, so many people gathered in one place we felt a bit uneasy.  Americans are simply not accustomed to so many bodies sharing the same space.  But it made me so happy to see all these people smiling, having a good time, spending time with friends outside in the sunshine.  I wish we did more of that sort of thing in our country.  Many of our gatherings, like mornings in the park, are focused on the children, not on the adults.

Friendly Planet saved the best for last; we visited a village just outside Beijing and had dinner with a host family.  We learned much about the history of the village from our delightful tour guide, who lives there, and had a tai chi lesson from a master.  He was so beautiful to watch.  It must take years and years to master those movements.  This village is known for its hand-carved furniture and we were treated to a tour of a working shop.  Then we went to the home of our hosts for the best meal we had on the entire trip.  The wife taught us how to make dumplings, but, of course, she made 99% of them since we were so slow!  There were many other dishes and the husband did most of the cooking. They were so friendly and gracious - they truly made us feel like honored guests.

I hope I have another opportunity to visit China.  We saw only a small percentage of the country - there is a lot more to see and learn.

There are photographs from our trip on my flickr site: santanartist

Questions are welcomed.


 
 

Starting Over

The last time I posted on this blog was in 2010, but I am starting over and hope that this time I will be able to keep it going.

I am busy with my etsy shop, making silk scarves and learning about dye. Still taking care of Charlie and Katie 4 days a week, and still doing photography.

Celebrated my 70th birthday with all the family and received a new bike which I love!

Here's a photo of the cake Nancy made for my birthday.  It's amazing.  A suitcase with labels for all the places we have been, plus my passport!  Isn't that just too much?  Nancy and I are going to China  on March 26th for 10 days. Will definitely blog about that!

Nemaste,
Dottie