Once in awhile I like to imagine what my life would be like without my "smartphone" and because of the creepy crawly feeling I get I hold my phone close and hope that it never goes away. It has become an extension of my hand - not so much my face anymore because I rarely "talk" on it. My phone has really become more a part of me than... well actual parts of me. If I need some quick inspiration I open the 3G browser and surf to my hearts content, I can carry on multiple text and instant message conversations, and if I get that terrible "I forgot to pay a bill" feeling I can check all of my accounts with the touch of the screen.

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Fall is here and so is the Fall Festival that River Heights Elementary puts on to raise money. Every kid in town has been working hard to earn money to buy themselves tickets for games, rides and goodies to eat. In Nancy Drew and The Clue Crew’s Ticket Trouble by Carolyn Keene the girls find themselves on the job again. Nancy and her friends have worked just as hard to earn their tickets as everyone else so when their friend Ned finds that his tickets have gone missing they just can’t turn down the case. They promise Ned that they will find his tickets before the end of the day, when the fair closes until next year.

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In book number two of The Jewel Fairies by Daisy Meadows, Kirsty and Rachel meet Emily the Emerald Fairy. The girls are at one of the biggest toy stores they have ever seen. Wall to wall with every toy they could possibly imagine, they wonder if they are going to meet any new fairies today or even find a missing jewel that Jack Frost has hidden in their world. The girls love helping the fairies from Fairyland and love that they have the coolest secret ever between them. They even get a laugh out of a fairy doll that they see in the toy store because to them, it looks nothing like a real fairy.

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In a shocking move that will shock and surprise everyone (are you shocked yet?) the Coca-Cola company has publicly admitted that their Vitaminwater product is not very healthy. 

In fact, a nonprofit company sued Coca-Cola for making false health claims, and Coke retaliated by basically saying that only an idiot would think their Vitaminwater beverage had vitamins in it.

You know, I'm starting to realize that no one really pays attention to the truth.   Why bother trying to explain things?  Just say what you want that thing to be - regardless of how preposterous you sound - and people will buy it.


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Have you ever noticed that Rush only talks about environmental issues with regards to climate change, which he of course dismisses as bunk?  (Actually that's not entirely true: he also talks about the Gulf oil spill, the environmental consequences of which he dismisses as bunk.)

This is interesting because everyone else in the world understands that there is a vast and varied collection of environmental issues.  Species depletion, wasting natural resources, plastic pollution in the oceans, Peak Oil, chemical contamination of our ground water… the list goes on and on.

I always thought that Republicans were against waste.  Isn't that a major plank in their platform?  No wasteful spending?  


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Let's Not Start Swearing Now.

Those of us with memories might remember that after 9-11 the government told us that the air around ground zero was safe, though their scientists must have known that smoke and toxins from the burnt buildings were still in the air. People got sick, some may died early. Why did the government tell that falsehood? Officials wanted to get Wall Street re-opened and for people not to leave and and not to stay away from the area in a panic.

Now the government is telling us that the sea food of the Gulf of Mexico is safe. Why? Because officials want to get the Gulf Coast economy going and don't want to panic people.

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Today, Monday, the commercial shrimp season opens in the Gulf of Mexico off the Louisiana coast, and -- Blue Monday! The Associate Press reports, " Shrimpers are nervous that they'll find oil in their catch." See the video.

Nervous they should be. The massive BP oil spill still lurks like a horrible monster over the lives of men and women trawling the Louisiana waters for a livelihood. BP and the government say: The danger is over. The spill has been stopped. The oil has been dispersed. The surface water has been swept of oil.The sea food is safe. We've tested it: First by the smell test, then the taste test, then we ran our chemical analysis, and we swear the stuff passed. Believe us, the sea food is not oil-contaminated.

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A tug of war in the summer heat?

It is the summer time, August. What else is there to do? It's is too hot to think, and so the residents of two Mississippi River towns have figured out what to do. Why shouldn't they do it?

It is the time of their annual Tug of War contest. A sweaty, can get dirty and grimy, battle of brawn and grip in the crazy heat -- Leave the brains to the people wearing the straw hats. The people have come to chill, to have fun.

Everyone needs fun. If we don't do the silly-crazy now and then, take a break from the serious, take the time out to just have fun, our lives would be boring.. Those moments of play, when we do or watch things that exist for the sole purpose of making us laugh, are what keep us going. Hell, those moments keep the world going.

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Who says that God leaves prayers unanswered? S/He certainly fulfilled those of a Christian shop manager in Florida. Nayara Goncalves, 20, is the manager of a mobile phone shop in Broward County, Florida. She is also a Christian—a pretty determined one, at that.

Rather than giving into a thief’s demands, peeing herself, or hiding beneath the counter, she actually talked him out of robbing her by using God as a bargaining chip.

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As a mom, I can tell you that I have mastered the art of holding it. In fact, I used to hold it even before I became a mother. I remember standing in lines at amusement parks, getting that nervous/excited pre-rollercoaster feel while in line that made me feel like I’d have to pee, and I’d tell my then-boyfriend, “I have to pee!” and he’d roll his eyes, knowing that A. I wouldn’t stop to pee and B. I would say the same thing in the next rollercoaster line. Maybe I’m just weird like that.

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