NOTE TO SELF: ONE GENERATION PLANTS THE TREES; ANOTHER GETS THE SHADE
Seems at times that there is a plethora of negative reports and stories focusing on errant youth. It's therefore refreshing to come across a "feel good" story that gives one hope for the future of mankind. It's the kind of story that makes you smile.
Young Jack Davis, aged 11, was perturbed upon learning that Florida restos throw out food due to legal restraints should anyone eating the food become ill or develop food poisoning, since he felt it could be recycled and given to homeless people. He had visited a homeless shelter on school field trips and worried about people going hungry.
Jack's idea was to pass a law that would give restaurant owners' some protection from lawsuits. He got his dad to float the idea to some Florida legislators.
It now seems certain that Jack's idea will become a law.
"If you take away the reason restaurants will not give food -- they will," he said. "And it's kind of it's a win-win situation 'cause the restaurants get to do something good."
When Jack's bill started gaining momentum, he was suddenly big news in Miami.
"When I go to school, people were chanting my name because they saw me on the cover of the Miami Herald," Jack said. "Over the whole day, they were asking me what does the law say. And in some of my classes they clapped as I walked in. If you think there's a problem in the world," he said, "you don't wait for other people to fix it. You have to try to fix it yourself."
Amen to that!
See a photo of Jack here: http://abcnews.go.com/WN/PersonOfWeek/story?id=4123327&page=1
Saturday, January 12, 2008
Thursday, January 3, 2008
Ho-hum...patience is the key word for live MusselCam
NOTE TO SELF: MUSSELS ARE NOT THE MOST VISUAL MULLOSKS
One thing for sure is that anybody hoping for some exciting viewing on MusselCam will be disappointed, but then that's the way Mother Nature works. Unbelievable as it may seem MusselCam located in Prince Edward Island, Canada, was named amongst the top 25 most interesting webcams in the world. Hey - now that's an accomplishment!
That lone blue mussel is the only one of two Canadian entries to crack EarthCam's list. A webcam tracking the lighthouse at scenic Peggy's Cove in Nova Scotia
(www.peggyscovewebcam.ca/live) is also on the webcam network's list of favourites.
For the uninitiated and according to Wikipedia, "the common name mussel is used for members of several different families of clams or bivalve molluscs, from both saltwater and freshwater habitats."
Visually they aren't anything to look at being round and...round.
The message on the web page says it all: "mussels grow very, very slowly. Please check back often."
Garner Quain, the co-owner of Flex Mussels, which has locations in Charlottetown and Summerside, was surprised to hear his camera made the list.
"I didn't ever think that it would make any kind of Top 10 list, other than the fact that it's so, kind of, notoriously boring," said Quain."There's a few other ones on the internet that are sort of old favourites that have kind of always been running, so it was really kind of an homage to those, so to be included among them is a nice little honour."
Quain said MusselCam gets more than 1,000 hits a day.
Anyway, if you've got a lot of time - and patience - drop by the musselcam site here:
http://www.flexmussels.com/musselcam.html
Let us know if anything exciting happens. Yawn...
One thing for sure is that anybody hoping for some exciting viewing on MusselCam will be disappointed, but then that's the way Mother Nature works. Unbelievable as it may seem MusselCam located in Prince Edward Island, Canada, was named amongst the top 25 most interesting webcams in the world. Hey - now that's an accomplishment!
That lone blue mussel is the only one of two Canadian entries to crack EarthCam's list. A webcam tracking the lighthouse at scenic Peggy's Cove in Nova Scotia
(www.peggyscovewebcam.ca/live) is also on the webcam network's list of favourites.
For the uninitiated and according to Wikipedia, "the common name mussel is used for members of several different families of clams or bivalve molluscs, from both saltwater and freshwater habitats."
Visually they aren't anything to look at being round and...round.
The message on the web page says it all: "mussels grow very, very slowly. Please check back often."
Garner Quain, the co-owner of Flex Mussels, which has locations in Charlottetown and Summerside, was surprised to hear his camera made the list.
"I didn't ever think that it would make any kind of Top 10 list, other than the fact that it's so, kind of, notoriously boring," said Quain."There's a few other ones on the internet that are sort of old favourites that have kind of always been running, so it was really kind of an homage to those, so to be included among them is a nice little honour."
Quain said MusselCam gets more than 1,000 hits a day.
Anyway, if you've got a lot of time - and patience - drop by the musselcam site here:
http://www.flexmussels.com/musselcam.html
Let us know if anything exciting happens. Yawn...
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
SCHOOL RELEASES 2008 LIST OF USELESS WORDS
NOTE TO SELF: AS A *WORDSMITH*, *IT IS WHAT IT IS* USING CERTAIN WORDS OR PHRASES
Go figure that someone would create a list subscribing that certain words and phrases are useless. We're talking words that most of us have used over time and now they're - Lake Superior State University - suggests that we find others.
In all there are 19 words or phrases that appear in its List of Words Banished from the Queen's English for Mis-Use, Over-Use and General Uselessness.
The school in Michigan's Upper Peninsula released its 33rd list Monday, selecting from about 2,000 nominations. This year's list derives from more than 2,000 nominations received through the university's website, www.lssu.edu/banished. Word-watchers target pet peeves from everyday speech, as well as from the news, education, technology, advertising, politics, sports and more. A committee makes a final cut in late December. The list is released on New Year's Day.
Here is the 2008 list:
PERFECT STORM
WEBINAR
WATERBOARDING
ORGANIC
*WORDSMITH/WORDSMITHING
AUTHOR/AUTHORED
POST 9/11
SURGE
GIVE BACK
BLACK FRIDAY
BLANK
BACK IN THE DAY
RANDOM
SWEET
DECIMATE
EMOTIONAL
POP
*IT IS WHAT IT IS
UNDER THE BUS
If you surf on to the university's site here: http://www.lssu.edu/banished/current.php there's a list of who nominated the words i.e. ordinary people who claim they have a pet peeve against one of the above-mentioned words/phrases, and the reasons or rationale behind their distaste for them.
Looking them over can't say that any of them particularly upset me. For me the mere concept of accepting words nominated by...anybody for no good reason, is ludicrous and a reason not to take this seriously. Strikes me that the university is using their annual listing as a ploy to attract potential students.
Go figure that someone would create a list subscribing that certain words and phrases are useless. We're talking words that most of us have used over time and now they're - Lake Superior State University - suggests that we find others.
In all there are 19 words or phrases that appear in its List of Words Banished from the Queen's English for Mis-Use, Over-Use and General Uselessness.
The school in Michigan's Upper Peninsula released its 33rd list Monday, selecting from about 2,000 nominations. This year's list derives from more than 2,000 nominations received through the university's website, www.lssu.edu/banished. Word-watchers target pet peeves from everyday speech, as well as from the news, education, technology, advertising, politics, sports and more. A committee makes a final cut in late December. The list is released on New Year's Day.
Here is the 2008 list:
PERFECT STORM
WEBINAR
WATERBOARDING
ORGANIC
*WORDSMITH/WORDSMITHING
AUTHOR/AUTHORED
POST 9/11
SURGE
GIVE BACK
BLACK FRIDAY
BLANK
BACK IN THE DAY
RANDOM
SWEET
DECIMATE
EMOTIONAL
POP
*IT IS WHAT IT IS
UNDER THE BUS
If you surf on to the university's site here: http://www.lssu.edu/banished/current.php there's a list of who nominated the words i.e. ordinary people who claim they have a pet peeve against one of the above-mentioned words/phrases, and the reasons or rationale behind their distaste for them.
Looking them over can't say that any of them particularly upset me. For me the mere concept of accepting words nominated by...anybody for no good reason, is ludicrous and a reason not to take this seriously. Strikes me that the university is using their annual listing as a ploy to attract potential students.
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