Her spectacular vocal gift..a sort of culmination of other notable talents  who came before her and were silenced too early. The genius that was Amy Winehouse seemed to embrace parts  of these accomplished artists, the result..a rich, sultry, unique voice, colored here and there with dashes of  a quirkiness  that dared us to turn our ears off and hearts on. Is it any wonder then, when she first opened her mouth and sang on a world stage we were taken aback by it’s power,  impressive proportions and most original delivery.  In her grandest moments..in her most sorrowful, in your face moments..Amy compelled us to watch her, to hear her..and above all..to embrace her.

Looking away just wasn’t an option when it came to Amy winehouse.

I wish she weren’t dead to this world, I wish she had lived to hold her first child, I wish she had sung a lifetimes worth, and maybe she did, maybe..she did just that.

In my ♥ I sense this little lady continues on elsewhere, call it what you will, but energy like that goes a long way for a long long time.

Rest easy Miss Amy

♥

And thank you.

Could you pass the citizenship test? Find out, right now. Click here and test your chops. Or read below and take the test.

http://www.cjad.com/blog/KimFraserShow/blogentry.aspx?BlogEntryID=10170652

Quote below taken from Ms. Krishnan that speaks to us all:

“These men are among us. They are our brothers, our husbands, our brothers, our neighbors. If there was no customer, there would be no product. ”

Sunitha Krishnan fights sex slavery

As a race, the human race, we simply have to do better than this.

The below posted by: Kayla Coleman – Care2
February 22, 2010

Fashion makes a statement. Even if you are not the type of person who goes to fashion shows, reads fashion magazines, or even vaguely pays attention to what they grab from their closet in the morning. You can’t deny it: fashion matters.

Even if you aren’t particularly picky about your daily ensemble, all clothes have a design. They’re all made from something. The shape, the fabrics, the essence, it all stems from a mother fashion puppeteer. This puppeteer’s fashion designs trickle down to every Target and outlet store known to man. The imitation pieces are seen on the backs of everyone from glamazons to truckers to preschoolers.

The convention of said fashion puppeteers — New York’s Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week — happened last week. And, unfortunately, two very political trends stuck out on nearly every designers’ runway: fur and wool.

“Fur!” you may be saying. “Disgusting! How cruel!” 

But wool? Many people believe sheep need haircuts, that we’re doing them a favor by shearing them. And isn’t wool a nice, eco-friendly, sustainable product?

Well, no. A lot of people — even those still wearing fur — have heard of the cruelty of the fur industry. There are a number of videos (viewer beware: the images are hard to handle) showing the horrible realities of fur. But the cruel happenings within the wool industry don’t always garner the same attention. There are a lot of people who still consider wool to be a “humane” alternative to fur. And some eco-friendly clothing stores and websites carry wool products, adding to the misconception that wool is just a leftover from when a hippie gives a pet sheep a haircut.

But the real story of the wool industry is far from a fairytale of life on the commune.

Let’s start with this fact: people who shear sheep get paid per sheep, not by the hour. So when they cut sheep’s hair away, they want to do it as fast as they can, which inevitably leads to rough handling and abuse of the animals. The handlers don’t wait patiently for the sheep to canter over and the sheep don’t sit still while they’re being sheared. The process is quite rough. Most sheep are injured and bleed. To maximize thickness of the coat, many sheep are sheared in Spring, long before they would naturally shed their wool. This leaves sheep naked and cold. 

The sheep live in crowded, dirty conditions, like every other mass-produced animal. And like other exploited animals, we have bred sheep so large that they can barely support their own body weight. Many die in their holding pens. They get lice, fleece rot, foot rot and their tails are cut off without anesthesia. And male sheep are castrated without anesthesia, too. The procedure is either performed with a knife, or by placing a tight rubber band around the animal’s scrotum until it shrivels up and falls off. 

And many baby lambs born in these crowded conditions are trampled to death.

Then there’s mulesing, an incredibly painful and cruel practice only necessary because of the mutations we have bred into sheep to get the most wool out of them. Over 50 percent of the world’s Merino Wool comes from Australia, where the sheep’s wool is extra thick and the climate is extra hot and dry. Their skin is wrinkled and because they’re are so fat and live under the hot Australian sun, the skin folds become moist, love nests for flies, who burrow into the folds of the sheep’s skin. Maggots then infect the flesh, a condition known as flystrike. The maggots consume the sheep from the inside, leaving the sheep so distressed they stop eating, drinking and can not sleep. Can you blame them? They’re being eaten alive by maggots! If untreated, the sheep will die a slow, agonizing death. To avoid the skin folds from being infested, large chunks of skin are cut from the sheep’s rear end, which is known as “mulesing.” This procedure is done without any anesthesia or painkillers.  

And when sheep stop producing wool, they’re not sent to pasture, allowed to peacefully utter their last “bah.” Instead, when their production value is no longer enough for the wool industry, they’re sent to slaughter to benefit the meat industry. Doesn’t that make you feel all warm and cozy inside?

The whole theory of sheep “needing” to be sheared is concocted from human design. Natural, wild sheep will grow just enough fur to keep them warm in the winter and cool in the summer. They shed naturally, when necessary. But we have bred sheep to be wool-producing factories. As a result, they do need  ”haircuts”. But these haircuts are not animal-friendly. They are not benevolent favors. They are part of an industry–a machine that is not the “green” solution to fur that clothing designers claim. If you want to look at it purely from an environmental perspective, sheep need food, space and fuel for transportation just like cows and other factory-bred animals. They are livestock, part of a production that pollutes water, emits greenhouse gases and degrades natural resources. In Australia, sheep eat so much natural fauna that wallabies are endangered. And millions of kangaroos searching for food are killed upon invading the herd space.

So if you shun fur, consider yourself an environmentalist or an animal lover, or even if you’re a “cute-atarian,” someone who doesn’t eat anything they deem adorable (and what’s cuter than a lamb?), don’t pull the wool over your eyes. Wool may not be quite the same as fur, but it’s not far off either. Wool is warm, I’ll give you that. But there are non-wool alternatives that keep you just as warm during cold winter weather. The choices are out there if you look for them. 

We need to be the change we want to see. If we buy non-wool items, people will make non-wool winter clothes. We will find increasingly more materials and more technology that can replace wool, if there’s demand for it. Fashion Week may be the puppeteer of the clothing industry, but we don’t have to be puppets. Cut the strings. Check labels. The next time you are eco-shopping with your organic pals and scoffing at the fur-wearing hag buying the snakeskin clutch, check the label of that sweater you were eyeing. It may once have been a home for maggots on a sheep’s backside.

How Much Do You Really Know?
The Six Myths of Mulesing

http://www.savethesheep.com/f-MuelsingMyths.asp

http://www.weeklytimesnow.com.au/article/2008/10/17/16961_sheep.html

Care2 recently announced the 10 finalists in Care2′s “Hero Next Door” contest. If you haven’t voted yet, please be sure to vote for your favorite hero so that he or she has a chance to win $2,500 and a matching $2,500 for charity.

This contest is a great reminder that our communities are full of ordinary people doing extraordinary things to make a difference. We had more than 700 nominations honoring heroes doing everything from helping out a family member in need, to traveling across the world to assist strangers they have never met. Our finalists are making a difference in the areas of animal welfare, the environment, poverty, safety, health, and more.

I encourage you to read the stories of our top 10 finalists, and vote for your favorite. I promise you they will warm your heart, and remind you that it’s possible for all of us to make a difference.

The ten finalists:

http://www.care2.com/hero-next-door/

Source

Randy’s Blog 

More than a dozen dogs and their handlers will be on standby during the Olympics in case an avalanche hits.

Watch Video Click Here

Source:

Canadian Press

——————————————-

About 25 avalanche rescue dog teams will be working in Whistler and on Cypress Mountain during the Olympics

By Damian Inwood, The Province

About 25 avalanche rescue dog teams will be working in Whistler and on Cypress Mountain during the Olympics in case security staff get caught in backcountry snowslides.

The teams, from B.C., Alberta and Squaw Valley, Calif., will each work for about a week at the three mountain venues.

“There’ll be one dog and handler team, plus an assistant for each of the winter ski venues,” said Kyle Hale, the Golden-based president of the Canadian Avalanche Rescue Dog Association. “At any one time, there’ll be one for the Callaghan Valley, one for Whistler venue and one for the Cypress Mountain venue. We’re providing a total of about 25 dog-and-handler teams over the course of the six or seven weeks.”

The teams will work at the venues during daylight hours and will be on standby at night, he said. Hale added that CARDA is working with the RCMP’s Vancouver 2010 Integrated Security Unit but will also deal with any avalanche or search-and-rescue incident involving the public.

He said daily avalanche forecasts will be given to the teams so they can assess the hazard levels.

“Depending on the operational requirements, we’ll be all over the place,” he added. “The venues are quite small and we’ll have various modes of transportation, and it’s our hope we don’t need to activate. Our dogs ride chairlifts, helicopters, Ski-doos–any mode of winter transport.”

Hale said that while avalanches are rare in the ski resorts themselves, they’re common in backcountry areas where security staff will be working.

He said the California teams are involved because 2010 is the 50th anniversary of Squaw Valley hosting the 1960 Winter Games.

RCMP Cpl. Jen Allan said the ISU will cover the cost of accommodation and meals for the Canadian and U.S. teams, but will only pay travel expenses for the dogs and handlers from B.C. and Alberta.

She said the rescue association will supplement a “large contingent” of RCMP dog teams working in Vancouver and Whistler during the Olympics.

“The majority of them will be explosive-profile dogs and will be involved in sweeping the venues prior to [Olympics organizers] taking possession of them,” Allan said. “The sweeps will be occurring near the end of January.”

She said the rescue-dog association provides the security unit with special skills in avalanche situations and “helps us with the geographical challenges of securing a mountainous region.”

dinwood@theprovince.com

Source:

——————————————————

From his backyard in Fernie, B.C. Steve Morrison points out slide paths in the surrounding Lizard Range, where avalanches bring down hundreds of tons of snow, rock and tree at speeds of up to 139 kilometres an hour. It’s even worse than he’s describing. And his retriever-mix, ‘Mojo,’ knows all about it. The two form an Avalanche Rescue Dog team, one of four validated teams at Fernie Alpine Resort, each certified by the internationally renowned Canadian Avalanche Rescue Dog Association (CARDA). These teams are becoming more and more critical to avalanche rescue programs.

Fernie is poised to be Canada’s next boom resort town. In 1998, when the resorts of the Canadian Rockies took over the hill, the ski terrain doubled, and the numbers jumped from around 150,000 skiers a season to 300,000-plus in 2007. Add to that the huge dump of snow Fernie has had over the past few seasons (Fernie’s five enormous bowls receive an average of 29 feet of snowfall each winter – enough snow to cover a three-storey building) and that spells avalanche.

Prevention
“We see a lot of avalanches. Hundreds in a season,” says Steve, who helps bring many of them down. “We blast pretty well every morning,” he says, explaining the use of controlled explosives to knock down massive slabs of snow in order to mitigate the hazard. A member of the Canadian Avalanche Association, serving on its explosives committee, Steve fires the avalauncher. The Fernie patrol also deploys explosives from a helicopter on occasion, usually when the weather is good and the cornices are large.

Big shoes to fill
For Steve, a man with over 23 years of patrol in the snow, it was during the last four years, with his canine companion at his side, when he found his most critical role on the hill. “I was looking for a change, a new challenge. And, I was looking for a dog. When ‘Keno’ and Robin retired, there was a void. Mojo and I filled it.” Steve is referring to the retired senior Avalanche Rescue Dog team of Robin Siggers and his yellow Lab Keno, the Fernie team credited with the first and only live find by an avalanche dog in Canada.

Pretty big shoes to fill, but Steve has confidence in Mojo. “He is great in the snow – loves swimming in powder. He has long powerful legs, good nose, fine discipline and lots of energy.” Mojo received his first CARDA validation in January 2005. (CARDA’s qualifications require dogs and their handlers to be revalidated every year.)

Ready for anything
The training is extreme, but necessary. Mojo needs to be ready for anything. This includes transport by helicopter, snowmobile, snow cat and ski lift; travel on foot with handler on touring skis; backcountry and ski area rescue. “We are involved in mainly body recovery,” says Steve, referring to the unlikely probability of finding anyone alive. Avalanches are deadly. “But it is our goal to be on the scene quickly enough to beat the statistical odds.” If anyone can find a live buried person (who isn’t carrying or wearing an avalanche transceiver) in the shortest amount of time, it’s the dogs. At the very least, the dog’s keen scenting abilities bring a fast resolution to the tragedy: the recovery of the victim.

On the job
Well-trained dogs can roughly search an avalanche area as large as a football field eight times faster than a rescue team that probes the snow searching for dense matter (bodies). It’s the handler’s job to take charge, acting as the eyes and brains of a search so the dog can focus on its greatest attribute: its nose. A dog can detect an item as bland as a ski pole, buried metres deep in densely packed snow, thanks to its ultra-keen olfactory system, which is 10,000 to 10 million times more sensitive than a human’s. “Cold temperatures can be a real challenge, and avalanche debris can be dense with few air pockets. Prolonged wind can cause a crust so that nothing can seep out.”

Most victims are found near the run out of an avalanche, thus the handler directs the dog to sweep the toe first, nose to the ground, running back and forth in a tight zigzag pattern. Once an odour is detected, the dog alerts the handler by barking, wagging, or digging, paws churning the snow. It takes years of practice to train a dog to follow a scent, especially one that’s unfamiliar, in highly distracting and often inclement conditions.

“Ninety-eight percent of the time, nothing happens, but we have to be prepared,” says Steve. “On a typical day, we practise on the mountain, riding in a snow cat or on a snowmobile, training in obedience or uncovering hidden articles.”

The above written by:

Dawn Matheson
Dawn Matheson is a freelance writer, multimedia artist and web video producer living in Guelph, Ont. She claims a childhood spent in British Columbia gives her street cred to write about mountain culture. Her old friend ‘Brandy’ will forever inspire her to write about dogs.

(Excerpted from ‘Rocky Mountain snow dogs’ which originally appeared in Dogs in Canada’s January 2009 issue.)

Sources:

Canada Press

Dogs in Canada

Fernie Ski Patrol

CARDA aka Canadian Avalanche Rescue Dog Association

The painting ‘Bound’ from her ‘Mosiac’ series.

If you’ve reached a place in your life where your every fiber and instinct screams discontent..you must do something to facilitate a change before your ‘winter,’ or forever hold you tongue. I think things have to get ugly before they can get better. By ‘ugly’ I mean you have to dare venture into the uncomfortable places..the places most people ignore..bury or deny exist within themselves.

It’s simply too awkward..embarrassing and disquieting. Some of us would rather live with the consequence of dieing before having really lived..then risk stirring that pot.

It boils down to the human emotion of fear..we fear that which challenges us to change what we don’t like. Conning ourselves by believing we are comfortable as we are. And when we get too comfortable in a role (no matter the role be negative which they usually are) we tend to cacoon ourselves within the gates of its false safety.

It’s confusing..this state of acceptance some of us find ourselves waking up to half-way through life. Not a phenomenon unique to the addicted at all…no..many find themselves facing this dilemma. The housewife whose children are leaving for college..suddenly her role is no more..she realises she is unfullfilled..unhappy..unhusbanded…unaware.

A professional man who has lived his life in pursuit of ‘the dream,’ wakes to find himself alone in his perfectly decorated condominium. Staring at the back of yet another peroxide blonde headed sleeping stranger. He longs for the smells, sounds and simplicity of his childhood. A hot breakfast wafting from a bustling kitchen and loud cartoons to invade his noisy silence..is all the world he can think of now.

The drug addict drifting in and out of reality..recalling vaguely a time his tank didn’t need a grand assortment of chemicals to start his or her day..holding on to the dream of a perfect world..waking briefly to the old world of war & roses…until his next stop at the filling station takes him back to the safety of the dream from whence he came.

Of course not all of us reach this type of plateau..no..many are content with the direction their worlds are taking and see no need for a soul-searching trek into the labyrinth of their scary future. Still others could care less..stopped asking questions or demanding proof of their lives lifetimes ago. Gave in, succumed to what life threw at them. But for those of us not so settled..at peace..or willing to give up..we have a choice to make. Do we stay where we are..stunt our evolutionary process..or do we make a move..go for transformation..listen to the constant drumming of our regret…finish what we started and be damned the karma.

Not only do we have that choice to make..but we are then faced with the question of ‘Can we do it,’ do we know how..have we the stamina needed…the faith? It will not come naturally like it did in our youth..this change of life we seek. No..we’ve been stagnating for too long..content to stay in our quagmires of bullshit..societal classes and programming. Long gone is the blind faith of our youth..the raging hormones that shoot us forth almost unaware..no blissful ingnorant confidence to help us reach our growth potential. In youth (haphazard as it were)..at least we had those natural compadres to escort us through.

Is it even something we can plan for..or is it a crapshoot..this better reconstructed existense we seek..would we…will we..even recognise it..if and when we reach our new & improved regenerated..revitalized and better selves?

I ask you…

Is there life after discovering you’ve not really been living at all?

Yea..well..that comes pretty close to how I’m feeling at this..the 11th hour. The song itself can sometimes be nasally, self-indulgent, and just a tad whiney. If Ms. Amy spilled these lyrics the night before she had to go into rehab..she damn straight hit the mark on how this gal feels on the eve of her invalidation. Throw insecure, edgy, tense and overtired into the mix, and well you have to know, I just don’t wanna go to rehab..I said no no no!

To work on just me for 4 weeks..it has never been done. Despite all the positive optimisim and well wishers words of encouragement offered up today; when alone with my thoughts and the irritating ticking of a clock moving forward, a constant reminder of change on the horizon..I would almost rather do anything else.

And yes..I do know it’s the drug addict in me speaking, pushing away feelings, conning and resisting. She’s had control for many decades, and she’s running scared in the deepest recesses of my mind. Wish me luck.

Catch you on the rebound folks.

It’s not the first time since your death that I’ve sat in front of this screen trying to put words to these sputtering heated emotions. I’ve started many posts..but each seemed more scattered than the other..more confused..more desperate.

How does one ever really understand death, it’s the kinda thing we wing isn’t it, we do in the moment. Funerals are something we plan because it’s the only thing we can do when it comes to death.

Sucide is another.

Maybe your shame killed you, your lifelong inability to let pride take a backseat. Your shame along with our apathy, and so many other balls dropping led to the hour of your death. It wasn’t pretty your passing, the floors, the rooms wreaked of havoc , helter skelter bodily fluids, a testament to your final death throws.

And I feel so beaten inside, to know all that I wished..every deal I made..bargin I  bargained with the Gods who sit on high..that your life was still yours,  that no..it could not be so..denying every fiber in my being  when they screamed you were gone, had fallen on deaf ears.

I can’t even recall when it was I first stopped listening to you..it happened so slowly and over a long, long period of time. I think we all do it to some extent, stop listening I mean, to those we spend alot of time with or have known forever. It shouldn’t be so..the poets warn us that fleetingness could destroy us, people tell us we will one day wish we had more time, we ourselves notice it when others do it to someone else.

Still, we don’t seem to heed the warnings do we..or at least I didn’t. Because here I am..understanding more than I want to, exactly what all those forboding words of wisdom mean now..trying to absorb the finality of your passing, yet trying not to. I can’t get back all those precious minutes..over 35 years worth. I had you right in front of me..and just like that, a future with you in it is no more.

Just like that..so difficult..so real.

So fucking disorienting..this walk I take through your death.

The pounding weight of how badly I will miss you hits daily..my hand reaching out for the phone to call you..my question was a fast one, one I knew you’d have the answer to..had the answer to..and perhaps still do somewhere inbetween the pieces of time and space that we still breathing have yet to understand. But here on this earth..our bodies gravity grounded..guarded..cannot know what the dead know. Only the print of your voice on an answering machine greeted me..my heart skipping a beat as I heard it..as if you’d stepped out to get cigarettes, a drink or something ridiculously sweet..as if in a moment you’d get right back to me.

As if..

———————–

Gone to the Unseen

At last you have departed and gone to the Unseen.
What marvelous route did you take from this world?

Beating your wings and feathers,
you broke free from this cage.
Rising up to the sky
you attained the world of the soul.
You were a prized falcon trapped by an Old Woman.
Then you heard the drummer’s call
and flew beyond space and time.

As a lovesick nightingale, you flew among the owls.
Then came the scent of the rosegarden
and you flew off to meet the Rose.

The wine of this fleeting world
caused your head to ache.
Finally you joined the tavern of Eternity.
Like an arrow, you sped from the bow
and went straight for the bull’s eye of bliss.

This phantom world gave you false signs
But you turned from the illusion
and journeyed to the land of truth.

You are now the Sun -
what need have you for a crown?
You have vanished from this world -
what need have you to tie your robe?

I’ve heard that you can barely see your soul.
But why look at all? -
yours is now the Soul of Souls!

O heart, what a wonderful bird you are.
Seeking divine heights,
Flapping your wings,
you smashed the pointed spears of your enemy.

The flowers flee from Autumn, but not you -
You are the fearless rose
that grows amidst the freezing wind.

Pouring down like the rain of heaven
you fell upon the rooftop of this world.
Then you ran in every direction
and escaped through the drain spout . . .

Now the words are over
and the pain they bring is gone.
Now you have gone to rest
in the arms of the Beloved.

“Rumi The Sufi

- In the Arms of the Beloved-

Taken of the kittens born 6 weeks ago at my place. They are simply adorable.

Bear (gray & white playing with Twisted Sister (silver tabby/tiger cat) and Little Sister in the background. Howwver me thinks Little Sister may now be Big Brother. I’m not completely sure, but the kitten in the background was the smallest of the litter, 6 weeks later she/he is now the biggest.

If you have, or have had older indoor cats, then you know finding ways for them to exercise and keep fit can require some imagination. Not all of us have the time or patience to help them get it either. Although in truth, it’s not all that time consuming and can greatly improve not only their quality of life, but  help extend that life as well.

Here’s an article that provides ideas and reasons as to why it’s a wonderful idea to toss a ball with your cat.

Interactive play sessions are beneficial to an adult cat.

These sessions help to:

• build trust
• build confidence
• strengthen the bond you share with one another
• reduce fear
• provide exercise for an overweight or sedentary cat
• encourage a normal and healthy appetite
• ease tension in a house with multiple cats
• build confidence in a nervous or shy cat
• diffuse aggression
• correct inappropriate biting and scratching
• ease reactions to traumatic events
• ease discomfort of a new environment
• provide beneficial stimulation for depressed cats
• accelerate acceptance of new family members
• allow you to interact with an unpredictable cat without the risk of being injured

When owning an indoor only cat, the cat must be provided with opportunities for exercise and encouraged often to play games. Some welcome diversions you may offer to your cat are large, strong cardboard boxes, (be sure they never contained any hazardous material), corrurgated paper and tubes of cardboard. You may also wish to purchase an indoor ‘climbing tree’ from your local pet store. To remind a cat of its hunting skills, catnip mice and other similar toys will do nicely. Be sure to also provide some kind of a scratching post as it is essential.

I’ve aso found rolled up balls of paper (newspaper, foil etc.) have been some of my cats fav toys to chase, just throw them or flick the with your finger.

How to tell if your cats are playing or fighting:

It can be difficult to tell the difference sometimes between cat play or fighting. The following are a few general guidelines to help you determine which is which:

• When cats are playing, they may each hiss once or twice, but if your cats hiss several times, most likely they are fighting.

• Cats who play with one another tend to take turns in the offensive and defensive postures. While engaged in fighting, there’s usually no role reversal.

• No yowling or screaming should be present in play.

• Cats should not get hurt during play, unless it’s by accident. Cats fighting may give or receive a bite or scratch wound.

• When your cats are done playing they should act normal with each other, not avoid each other. After fighting, one or both of the cats will tend to stay out of each other’s way.

• If you have cats who don’t tend to get along with each other and they look like they’re playing, they may actually be fighting. If you are not sure, try to distract them with a positive noise, like the can opener or shaking the treat box. Be sure to keep it positive however. You don’t want to discourage a possible friendship if they really are playing.

Written by Laurie Buckley, a longtime cat lover and owner of currently five cats.

Oh the disgusting reminders of an opiate stupor, they are what nag at the coherant mind when it comes up from its influence…what reminds us of a life before them.

All around me the dust is flying, it’s everywhere..my apartment is filthy. Lighting a 3rd cigarette in almost as many minutes I check for messages on the phone, there is one…I enter my 1234 password..easy enough to remember lest I forget. I hear my mothers voice on the other end..she sounds happy on this day and gleefully informs me of her pending noontime visit. “I hope you’ll be up schatz..if not I have the key.” I hear her blow kisses before I delete the message.

I’m starting to get edgy, I slept on edge, I woke up on edge, I am now on serious edge. “Fuck” I mutter to no one “fuck fuck fuck..there’s just no way I can clean this place before she gets here..I just can’t.” Working up the courage to let her down once again..I resolve to call and say I’m too sick to see anyone…but I already know her answer. “I’m you mother Mary..I’m not ‘anyone,’ if you’re worried about the place don’t be..it’s me..I know you sweetie, I know you before even you know you.”

Putting the phone back down in its cradle I give up before I even begin. The cats pace nervously..tails twitching, all too aware of my mood..7 pairs of uneasy emerald..gold & copper slitted eyes watch me from out of their corners, they are hungry for breakfast. I do not heed their wants. Today..today has not started out well. I plug in the kettle for coffee, cats tredding all over the counters, still waiting, wanting breakfast, I stare at them..hostile, swear through my lips, bang a few things around, they scatter, they run, paw prints left in the dust where they were but nano-seconds ago. They’ll be back soon enough. Water is raging and boiling, demanding my attention..I roughly yank the electric cord out of its socket and all but throw a spoonful of instant into my cup..missed grains scatter all helter skelter like on the counter..on the floor…leaving little pools of greasy lakes where some have landed in spilled drops of water. I poor the boiling water into the cup, ice cold milk impatiently waiting to combust in the bottom. It all melds & blends together..reminding me of my lifes blood as it mixes with the heroin in my syringe when I pull back the plunger, swirling together until the darker red eats away at the golden liquid. Shaking my head to loosen the webs of confusion..I raise the cup to my lips and take a long but hurried sip, more like a gulp really. It’s not hot..I haven’t the patience for hot..for it to cool down..hence the milk going in before the boiling water.

It tastes like shit..like you’d expect it to taste, oily something floating around the top..a grain or two still visibly bobbing about in defiance..refusing the melt into oblivion that ate up its brother & sister grains. I laugh as I imagine even coffee grains, gendered coffe grains at that, fighting to live..resisting a death of meltdown. Survival of the fittest coffee grain..yea right..but my good God girl..have you lost it or what.

One of the cats creeps back in, looking quickly at me..making..but not keeping eye contact, used to my erratic behavior, she knows I’m not ready, she sits..looking downwards..pretending to busy herself with grooming. She waits ever so patiently, statuesque like.. safe in her knowledge that inevitabley I will get to her and the others. She..the matriarch of our tamed, housebroken pride has surely telepathically related this back to the other six..for there is an air of stillness all about the house. Not a creature was stirring, no sir-eee not even a sacrificial mouse.

Somewhere deep inside my heart I feel pangs of guilt at her kindness..her patience..her catlike understanding. She who once saved my life by licking & howling me back into consciousness while my mattress smoldered heavy smoke besides my head..or so I will believe until my dieing day. By the time I actually got up I could see nothing..not even my hand in front of me..her howls led me to the front door.

My Baabsy..my Baabalicious…my briiliant, tiny but very tough..black domestic , heavy lidded..copper-eyed cat..who at no more than 6 weeks old found me in the woods one late August after-noon, picking the last of summers sweet plump strawberries. I hadn’t the heart to leave her for some fitter carnivore to toy with & make supper of. Seventeen plus years later she’s earned her place hundreds of times over..being a far better friend to me than I to her.  Gently rubbing her ears as I leave the kitchen..muttering I’ll be back soon Baabs, be back real soon.

Slowly I make my way over to the computer..coffee cup & methadone in one hand..cigarettes and lighter balanced in the crook of the other arm as I squeezed the power bar switch on. Without warning the smell from the litter boxes assault my nostrils, burning them. I really can’t take living like this for much longer.

God please, a heads up, what is wrong with me? The puter revs itself into life, screen flickering, waking too..for another day, it is my lifeline, of late anyway.

I light my fifth cigarette of the morning…the smoke curls & dances up around my face, the cats prepare for another day of lung assault, I look away and close my eyes. A familiar voice pierces the silence….

“You’ve got mail.”

Not quite sure what to do with all those left over fruits & veggies from your magnificant garden? I mean delicious and fresh as they are, we can only eat so many juicy tomatos and lucious salads right. Well fret no more Veggie Trader has come up with a fast and easy way to ring all proud gardners & fresh veggie/fruit wating Americans together.

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Get started here —-> http://veggietrader.com/howitworks.php

Scientists are asking children, adults, families, educators and everyone from two to 102-years-old to join a citizens-science group to help our ladybugs.

Ladybugs were once one of the most common bugs found across the U.S. and Canada.  Controlling pests that attack farm harvests, balancing the ecosystems in forests and fields, their industriousness is an important part of the ecosystem.

During the past two decades as invasive look-alike ladybugs expanded their territories and pollution and habitat loss have crowded them out, species of Native ladybugs began vanishing and the invasive species began increasing. These include the multicolored Asian ladybug, checkerboard ladybug and the seven-spotted ladybug.

The larger, rounder multicolored Asian ladybug had been introduced as a biological control for scale bugs then mass produced across the lands. It even eats ladybug larvae. The checkerboard ladybug, which is small and yellow, hitched a ride from Europe through the St. Lawrence River in the 1960s and has since been traveling steadily southward. The seven-spotted ladybug, also from Europe, came to North America in 1956. Its population extended its range as the Native nine-spotted and two-spotted began disappearing.

“This has happened very quickly and we don’t know how this shift happened, what impact it will have, and how we can prevent more native species from becoming so rare,” said John E. Losey, Cornell University entomologist.

In June 2007 the Lost Ladybug collaborators, headed by Losey, received a $2 million grant from the National Science Foundation to expand the program throughout New York and extend it nationally. Their goal is to use citizen science to bring more participation in the search for the bugs. The ladybugs are collected into viles with twigs and drops of water. The date, time and place they were found are written down.  The discoveries are placed on a gray square and their pictures are taken. Digital images are sent to the projects website, or color prints can be mailed to the university. The ladybugs are returned to where they were found.

The database will help scientists understand the shifting changes on earth, help farmers with crops and further understanding of rare species and the ecosystems in which they live.  There are more than 5,000 species of ladybugs around the earth. About 450 are Native to North America.  It’s not yet known if the new species inhabiting the continent will serve the same function or favor the same habitats as the native species.

In turn, youth will learn about the place of the ladybug in the community of nature and the importance of biodiversity and conservation for the web of life through hands-on participation in research. Educational materials, books, collection viles and nets are provided through Cornell University. 

The project’s website will post instructions for finding collection sites, making nets, photographing ladybugs, submitting data and uploading photos. The website will also offer an automated identification feature to provide people with real-time feedback on species that have been collected. Ladybug lore, myths, songs and culturally based stories are being posted to explain the relationships between ladybugs, pests and our food.

As of this year, more than 3,000 ladybugs will be in the new data display sent in by hundreds of participants across the U.S. and Canada.

For more information visit the Lost Ladybug Project.

Source:

http://www.care2.com/causes/environment/blog/looking-for-the-lost-ladybug/

It’s funny how the urge to not write comes out of nowhere..comes many times when one is all pumped up and ready to write even. I suppose all bloggers go through stages of the blahs..of sitting down in front of the pc..coffee..cigs..Meriam Webster link and whatnot on standby. Hands poised above keyboard..fingers fluttering in anticipation..phone at the ready..and nothing..nada comes forth..at least nothing satisfy-able or printable does.

This past week I was struck with one of our modern day viruses (or I hope it’s a virus, and not prolonged nausea caused by some underlying problem). It came out of nowhere..some friends picked up two air-conditioners I no longer had use for. Right after they left I’d no sooner sat down to a cup of mocha java when this overwhelming urge to upchuck came over me. I never actually did (puke), but this waterlike spit (I know..yuck..but that’s what it was), came pouring out of my mouth. And so has been the rest of this week.

Yesterday I woke feeling better and thought..yay it’s gone, by late afternoon it made an appearance again, and this morning I still feel like woozy lou-lou. I can’t be pregnant..and I’m not on a boat so day 4 of this..and the mystery illness carries on. Getting my daily methadone in OJ down wasn’t & isn’t easy..the tatse just made me gag, so a hit of jazz calms my stomach a little and does what the ‘not going down methadone’ wasn’t doing. As such, this virus or whatever it is, has ixnayed any plans I had of trying to follow a methadone only regime.

For this week anyway.

Okay..back to the reason for this post or first title..since I’ve sort of covered the second title..that’s done with for now.

Click Here

Like I said..it made my day, nausea and all.

Hope it makes yours..even a little bit.

Later people

narrated by Joqiun Pheonix

Click here

Powerful stuff

Wednesday August 26, 2009, 9:41 PM 

One research study supports this but what does the heroin addict do after the research is completed?

The study described below says the following:

“The safest and most effective treatment for hard-core heroin addicts who fail to control their habit using methadone or other treatments may be their drug of choice, in prescription form, researchers are reporting after the first rigorous test of the approach performed in North America….”. The study, appeared in the current issue of the New England Journal of Medicine. “It showed that heroin works better than methadone in this population of users, and patients will be more willing to take it,” said Dr. Joshua Boverman, a psychiatrist at Oregon Health and Science University in Portland…. “Perhaps the biggest weakness of methadone treatment, Dr. Boverman said, is that ‘many patients don’t want to take it; they just don’t like it.’”

It is understandable why there was better retention in treatment when addicts took IV heroin vs methadone. People like heroin over methadone because their mission is to get high and heroin does the job best! They reduced their illicit activity because heroin is provided for them and they don’t need to steal to find money for drugs.

What this study is saying is no different than we would expect but where do we go with it? Do we switch addicts from methadone to heroin knowing that when they are stabilized with as high a dose as possible, they will still want to get high with more. Heroin is not like methadone. People get high from it and want more when they reach a stabilizing dose. If we don’t give them more they are likely to get it illegally since they are still addicts who want to get high and the heroin is getting them high. If we give them more, how much more? Until they OD? This in fact happened in the research study with several addicts. Do we expect them to work while they are high on heroin?

It is my opinion that stabilizing motivated addicts with methadone works but it won’t work with heroin. This experiment with legally dispensed heroin was attempted from 1914 with the Harrison Act and the opening of 44 free heroin clinics. All clinics were closed in 1924 due to the failure of the project. What happened is that addicts got their heroin from the free clinics and got more heroin from the black market so they could get high. It did nothing to curb addiction and many died of OD’s.

———————–

August 20, 2009
Study Backs Heroin to Treat Addiction
By BENEDICT CAREY

The safest and most effective treatment for hard-core heroin addicts who fail to control their habit using methadone or other treatments may be their drug of choice, in prescription form, researchers are reporting after the first rigorous test of the approach performed in North America.

For years, European countries like Switzerland and the Netherlands have allowed doctors to provide some addicts with prescription heroin as an alternative to buying drugs on the street. The treatment is safe and keeps addicts out of trouble, studies have found, but it is controversial — not only because the drug is illegal but also because policy makers worry that treating with heroin may exacerbate the habit.
The study, appearing in the current issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, may put some of those concerns to rest.

“It showed that heroin works better than methadone in this population of users, and patients will be more willing to take it,” said Dr. Joshua Boverman, a psychiatrist at Oregon Health and Science University in Portland.

Perhaps the biggest weakness of methadone treatment, Dr. Boverman said, is that “many patients don’t want to take it; they just don’t like it.”

In the study, researchers in Canada enrolled 226 addicts with longstanding habits who had failed to improve using other methods, including methadone maintenance therapy. Doctors consider methadone, a chemical cousin to heroin that prevents withdrawal but does not induce the same high, to be the best treatment for narcotic addiction. A newer drug, buprenorphine, is also effective.

The Canadian researchers randomly assigned about half of the addicts to receive methadone and the other half to receive daily injections of diacetylmorphine, the active ingredient in heroin. After a year, 88 percent of those receiving the heroin compound were still in the study, and two-thirds of them had significantly curtailed their illicit activities, including the use of street drugs. In the methadone group, 54 percent were still in the study and 48 percent had curbed illicit activities.

“The main finding is that, for this group that is generally written off, both methadone and prescription heroin can provide real benefits,” said the senior author, Martin T. Schechter, a professor in the School of Population and Public Health at the University of British Columbia.

Those taking the heroin injections did suffer more side effects; there were 10 overdoses and six seizures. But Dr. Schechter said there was no evidence of abuse. The average dosage the subjects took was 450 milligrams, well below the 1,000-milligram maximum level.

About 663,000 Americans are regular users of heroin, according to government estimates. The researchers said 15 percent to 25 percent of them were heavy users and could benefit from prescription heroin. That is, if they ever were to get the chance. Heroin is an illegal, Schedule 1 substance, meaning it has a high potential for abuse and serves no legitimate medical purpose. That designation is unlikely to change soon, researchers suspect.

In an editorial with the article, Virginia Berridge of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine concluded, “The rise and fall of methods of treatment in this controversial area owe their rationale to evidence, but they also often owe more to the politics of the situation.”

Source: NJ.com @http://www.nj.com/newark/index.ssf/2009/08/treat_heroin_addiction_with_he.html

MEXICO CITY — Investigators hunted for suspects Thursday following the execution of 18 youths at a drug rehab center in the border town of Ciudad Juarez, one of the most brazen episodes yet in Mexico‘s drug cartel wars.The attackers on Wednesday broke down the door of El Aliviane center in Ciudad Juarez, just across the border from El Paso. They then lined up the victims against a wall and opened fire, according to Arturo Sandoval, a spokesman for the regional prosecutors’ office.

 It was the third recent attack on a drug treatment center in Ciudad Juarez. Patricia Gonzalez, the prosecutor of Chihuahua state, where Ciudad Juarez is located, said Thursday that the centers have frequently been used by drug cartel members as hide-outs from police or rival gang members.

 Enrique Torres, spokesman for the government’s military and police task force in Chihuahua, said there was no evidence yet that any of the 18 dead and two injured youths were working for the cartels. “As far as we know, all of them were people who were being rehabilitated,” Torres said.

 In all, 40 people were murdered throughout Chihuahua on Wednesday, according to Mexican newspaper El Universal, which called it the bloodiest day in “the history of crime” in the state.

 The massacre came just hours after President Felipe Calderon defended his anti-drug efforts in Mexico’s equivalent of the State of the Union address. Also Wednesday, the No. 2 security official in Calderon’s home state of Michoacan was shot dead when several gunmen attacked his car.

 More than 13,500 people have died in drug-related violence since Calderon took office in 2006, prompting increasing questions about if and when his strategy will pay off.

 ”We are losing” the drug war, said Victor Quintana, a sociologist and expert on crime at Autonomous University of Ciudad Juarez. “Drug deaths are up, petty crime is up, the biggest drug traffickers here in Chihuahua (state) have not been caught. By any measure, this strategy is not working.”

 Calderon has cast the drug war as part of a larger quest for law and order in a country where drug cartels have penetrated key institutions such as the army and police. His government has poured 4,500 troops into Juarez alone.

 The shooting also shows the shortcomings of Mexico’s drug rehabilitation centers, said Regina Kuri, a spokeswoman for the Monte Fenix Center for Advanced Studies in Mexico City, which trains drug counselors.

 Many of these centers are located in Mexico’s worst neighborhoods. They lack the money and contacts to send patients away to safer areas where they are shielded from temptation and retribution, Kuri said.

 ”You need to remove these people from these places and give them real treatment, not just a daily plate of beans,” Kuri said. Under Calderon, Mexican security officers have arrested several top cartel leaders and seized record amounts of drugs. However, new cartels such as the La Familia syndicate in Michoacan have emerged to take the place of weakened cartels.

 ”It’s focused on this absurd fight, where you patch over one hole and 10 others open up,” Kuri said. “The points of (drug) sales just multiply.”

Contributing: Sergio Solache; the Associated Press

 Credit for the above to: USA today @http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2009-09-03-mexico-slayings_N.htm?csp=34

By Rhonda Callow

Seems a little far fetched and absurd, doesn’t it? But will conversations like the one above become commonplace and an everyday battle with future generations, as it is now for us to teach our children to chew with their mouth closed and to not fart in public?

In a recent article called ‘Don’t post that!’ Networking etiquette emerges, Barbara Ortutay says, “Making matters trickier, good etiquette on Facebook might not apply on Twitter or in an e-mail. These days, milestones like marriage, pregnancy, breakups and divorce are being described over more forms of communications than ever.”

Do you think there should be “rules” and order to how milestones are announced? For example, let’s say I found out I was pregnant. Once I let my husband, sister and dad know, am I free to Facebook it or do I still need to personally tell best friend #1 and best friend #2? If that’s the “rule”, wouldn’t that then hurt the feelings of best friend #3, as she would then know she wasn’t my #1 BFF, as she had thought? Do you think it’s acceptable to use social networks to announce various life events and achievements? If so, who do you need to tell in person and who can hear the news from their computer or cell phone? Who’s to say what’s okay and what isn’t?

Credit for the above goes to:

Rhonda Callow @

http://www.sync-blog.com/sync/2009/09/will-our-kids-be-teaching-their-kids-computer-manners.html

To dance under one full moon can be magical..just imagine three.

The earth, it was revealed, once had three moons, the two lost moons may have crashed into the surviving moon, or been sucked into the sun, or flung out of the solar system to drift through deep space
from Findings, Harper’s Magazine, August 2008

The above found at

Schroedinger’s Cat Blog

Earth may once have had more than one moon, most probably two more, NASA scientists think.

However, researchers Jack J. Lissauer of NASA’s Ames Research Center near Mountain View, Calif., and John E. Chambers of the Carnegie Institution of Washington figure quite a bit of that ejected matter would have recollected into two other small moons at the so-called “Lagrangian points” or “Trojan points.”

So much matter would have been thrown up into space that it recollected under its own gravity to form the Moon, which for millions of years would have glowed red-hot as the molten rock from the planetary collision cooled.

Those are fixed places in the Moon’s orbit around the Earth where the gravity of both large bodies would keep smaller objects in stable positions.

“The giant impact that likely led to the formation of the Moon launched a lot of material into Earth orbit, and some could well have been caught in the Lagrangian points,” Lissauer tells New Scientist magazine.
For example, there are two groups of asteroids in the Lagrangian points of Jupiter’s orbit around the Sun — one called the “Greek camp” leads the giant planet by 60 degrees in its circular orbit, while the other group, dubbed the “Trojan camp,” follows 60 degrees behind.

Lissauer and Chambers figure the two small moons would have orbited Earth for about 100 million years before the slight gravitational tugs from the solar system’s other planets sent them spiraling off course, either to crash into the Moon or Earth or to drift off into space.

In a separate study, astrophysicist Matija Cuk of the University of British Columbia thinks the smallest possible moons, those only a few dozen miles across, could have lasted for up to a billion years at the Lagrangian points in the Moon’s orbit.

“They would have looked more like Jupiter or Venus in the sky than a satellite,” Cuk said to New Scientist. “They would have resembled very bright stars.”

Credit for the above to:

NASA & Fox News

Did Earth once have multiple moons?

Click Here to Read

 Forever actually..that I’ve haven’t put fingertips to keyboard, and let pour forth the scatteredness that runs my mind.

I do know.

There was a time blogging..journaling..typing..call it what you will..was something to look forward to..something I did to keep track of, and wrap up my day.  But of course as is usually the case..I grew away from it..got busy with the mundane..the bullshit that distracts me from what I should be doing, as opposed to what I want to do.  Now,..I consider writing a healthy way for me to get some peace of mind..some order if you will. As I metioned earlier my gray matter tends to scatter if I don’t reign myself in.

Scattered = trouble = poor choices = repitition = using drugs..specifically..the drug of heroin.

Some one and a half, close to two years have passed since I’ve made a whole hearted attempt at keeping records of time spent. Rather I’ve reposted entries, written a few very shitty new ones, and pretty much ignored the great many lapses inbetween each. I was bummed when the host site for heroindiaries.com ousted us for not getting it together and fixing the many control panel errors causing them grief. The person responsible for that part of it got irresponsible..not blaming..just saying. And as nasties seem to happen in at least double digits my pc crashed, I hadn’t backed-up and much of what I’d written over the last 5 years along with countless unfinished entries vanished. So yea, I was down in spirit at having to say good-bye to those words, who knows if they’ll ever come back around again in exactly the same fashion.

Probably not.

And if one writes, one knows that every once in a great while, genius will find its way  into a sentence or three of a long entry. Gone they are to the wordsmith bone yard..and may they rest well, from the smallest morpheme to the contridictory oxymoron..scattered..lieing askew one on top of the other, until the next mind dreams a way to express them in a perfect symmetrical harmonious arrangement.       

Since my long absenteeism  I’ve seen the inside of prison yet again, am out on bail, rehab a condition of said bail, and said case has now been postponed for over a year. I happened to be inside when all this host cancellation thing went on. Beg as I did,  Bluehost felt no responsibilty despite the fact they debited my cc for the upcoming quarter. The backup didn’t go through, yes they credited my card..but I’d of much rather had all my writing. It’s unlike me to give up and in when fighting what I think is a reasonable fight..but I did.

Anyway..that was yesterday..and yesterday’s gone.

Let’s see, what else..but of course, what did I get arrested for. Trafficking, conspiracy to traffic, and possesion with intent to traffic. Fun eh..so not. It was surreal the whole thing..being back behind bars after 20 years, something I never thought I’d be again. Watch out for that word ‘never,’ folks, it’ll get ya each and every time. Did I feel like an idiot extrodinaire..oh you bet Idid..and was and to some extent still do. To admitt to the self  you’re I”m  back to where you I started from, is the most difficult for me. It used to be I questioned my ethics and morals, like how could I barter in wares that have caused those I love, myself, strangers & friends..much personal grief & loss. But it’s not the case anymore, I’ve come to realise, the drug, though the catalyst for so much of the grief I mentioned, is not the end result nor actual cause. No, it is a damaged part of our core selves that leads us to pick them up, but it in itself is not the cause.

 This whole imprisoning people for dealing drugs, street level drugs I speak of here, is such an amazing waste of not only the taxpayer dollar, but all the resource people & effort that goes into incarcerating them. The vaste majority of street level dealers have serious addictions of their own. This draconian ‘punish them all and throw away the key’ attitude we’ve fallen comfortably into here in North America does nothing, and I mean nothing to get them back to a place where they could once again be productive members of society. No, it most certainly compounds the problem and 9 times out of 10, said person will be back in the system repeatedly.

How does that ‘fix’ anything?

I get that we must be responsible for fixing ourselves, that to depend or expect society to do it is impossible, shifting the blame and not owning our own mistakes. But in truth society eggs its way into our lives does it not, not only an addicts life, but each and every life. When  laws dictate what human beings can or cannot do, or have in their lives, re: ‘illegal drugs,’ in this case, then society to that same extent, makes itself responsible. For instance, alchohol is no longer illegal, it does equal the amount of damage drugs do in the way of health and social/personal problems. There is virtually no difference between the two, yet my problem remains illegal to consume on a personal level.

There is rampant hyprocracy here. The war on drugs is a failure it will never be a success. Time to move on..like 30 years ago.

I’m not saying make it legal to deal drugs, but the time has come to decriminalize them, it only makes sense so we as a society can focus/move on to solutions that will actually work.

You can read more on the Decriminalization idea here:

http://www.nationalfamilies.org/publications/catalogue.html

My future or should I say my freedom, is up for grabs, next court date is in mid September, we’ll see what becomes of me then. I go into rehab in the next couple of weeks, so blogging will take a back seat at least for awhile.

I lost a very close friend at the end of April, he was the last of the old ones, the ‘I knew you when’ ones. The autopsy report is still not back, what do they count foranyway, the news is never good. In the end it doesn’t matter how he died, it only matters that he did. I will miss him, I do miss him, he was someone who was always there, knew me like not many do, and loved me despite.

My oldest cat, Baabsy aka Baabaliscious 17  1/2, passed last Wednesday night. She had CRF aka Feline Chronic Renal Failure. She fought the good fight, lived 2 years after being diagnosed, but in the end, not even she, who had the heart of a kitten, ruled this roost with fairness and compassion, and was as fiesty as they come, could beat this terrible disease that takes more older cats than anything else.  I miss her jumping up on this desk 5 times a day to drink ice water out of a shot glass, I miss her unique call for me when she wasn’t sure where I was, I miss the warmth of her curling up between the middle of my legs every night to sleep, I miss how she licked clean the other cats and me of anything she thought shouldn’t be there. But most of  all, I miss the constant sight of her padding softly through my world.

Our Baabsy

My Heart

August 1992 ~ August 2009