Colorful Biker has electric motor for that uphill oomphPhoto by MS(R)M
Hi again and yep, from the ramparts of the Bastion on the Puget Sound, it’s been another interesting week. Well, I don’t know about the rest of you but I haven’t paid a lot of attention to American vice-president Joe Biden since the election. Second bananas have never impressed me a lot.
Joe looks a lit-tle like Spiro Agnew, except that he keeps his hands in his own pockets. Unlike another vice president, Dick Cheney, Joe’s not a disciple of Prince Machiavelli and unlike Richard Nixon, he doesn’t have five o’clock shadow and I’ve never seen a photograph of him doing stupid things with a beagle. Oh and yeah, unlike Dan Quayle, Joe also appears to have mastered high school level spelling and grammar. So the fact that he’s a bit banal and off the scope doesn’t bother me.
I owe American Vice-President Joe Biden an apology, big time, and from now on, I’m paying more attention to him. He took a plan which originated in Berkeley, California and developed it on a national level. As San Francisco Chronicles reporter Carolyn Jones explains:
Biden's program, known as Recovery Through Retrofit, creates a framework for cities, counties and states to set up tax districts that allow residential and business property owners to install solar panels and make other energy improvements, repaying the investment over a 20-year property tax assessment.
Well, to no one’s surprise, I imagine, the swine flu is certainly impacting the way Americans live. I was in our local Safeway (chain grocery store) the other day and all of the checkers and baggers had blue surgical gloves on. A spokesperson for the store explained that there wasn’t really an official policy in place but that Safeway employees were encouraged to take appropriate steps to protect the health of themselves and their customers. The New York Times has a splendid and informational overview on this from a national perspective. Please go here.
The swine flu vaccine is now available to Canadians after Ottawa this week approved a strain of it for its citizens. Two million doses have already been shipped to the provinces and territories and two to three million a week will be distributed until the entire country is protected. Canada has a population of about 33-million.
Well, a study in Japan apparently proves that chimpanzees are capable of being nice to one another without being trained to do so. Researchers term the behavior “human-like altruism,” which sort of has me shaking my head a little. While I grant you that we are capable of considerable kindness to one another, we have also devised more ways to tease, taunt, insult, exploit, injure maim, torture, kill and annoy each other than any species – flora, fauna or hybrid – in the history of the planet and, I suspect the universe. So while I applaud the behaviour, I’m not quite up to slandering the chimpanzee by suggesting that compassion and generosity are necessarily intrinsic human traits. I suspect we learned such behaviour from high mountain gorillas, when the gorillas were in exceptionally good form.
If I didn’t live in a state whose unofficial “creature” is the banana slug, this second critter feature would tweak me a little. But in happened in Australia, where everything is upside down to begin with. Nine years ago, Tasmanian police investigated the scene of the robbery of a 71-year-old woman. At the scene they found a leech and extracted from it a sample of the blood it was engorged with for a DNA profile. When Peter Cannon was arrested on an unrelated crime last year, they took a sample of his DNA and lo and behold (I like saying that), the match placed him at the scene of that earlier crime and he pleaded guilty to it this week. Yep, I know. So check it out here. And yep, sounds like television series material to me; CSI Down Under and g’day, mate.
We mentioned last week that Vancouver, our sister city to the north, is preparing for a significant increase in electric cars thanks to a deal worked out with Nissan and endorsed by both Victoria and Ottawa. The U.S. federal government has decided to fund a project expected to put 1,000 quiet autos in the Puget Sound area and provide an “electric corridor” on Interstate Five from Eugene (mid-Oregon) to Vancouver, B.C., Canada. Washington was among five states involved in a study on the feasibility of “electrification” through a $100 million grant from the Department of Energy under the economic recovery program. For more about this one, please go here.
I used to live in Southern California back when smog and banal weather were still major pains in the psyche. One of the reasons I survived the last of my Navy enlistment and my university schooling down there was the Los Angeles Times and it’s “only the LAT could get away with this” headlines. This one got me going because I also like bicycles but I’m not a fanatic about them. I loved having one built for two and a significant other who loved to pedal. That meant that going uphill, I didn’t need to, and I’m sorry. I admit that’s not very cavalier but it is how my mind works. That’s the teaser. Check out the story here under “Electric bikes are all green (colors vary)”
And finally, since one of you asked me what I thought of that Colorado publicity junkie, his family and his balloon, I think he needs the services of a mental health professional and his kids a better paternal role model. I think that not only should he be required to pay back every cent of the cost of rescue, he should have to give all of us held spellbound and aching of heart by that particular dog and pony show $10 an hour for that monumental waste of time. I also think he should be required to spend 20 hours a week community service time over-dubbing Billy Mays infomercials. It’s creepy watching a dead guy promote stuff for $19.95 and this other jackass would make a nice addition to the weird team.
Well, that’s it for this week, folks. Take care, stay well and thanks once again for the ear.
Rusty
NORTHSTAR RECOMMENDS
TO YOUR HEALTH
If you’d like to know whether your eating habits are either adding years to your life or taking them off, take this RealAge quiz. It will not only score your real age against your health age but give you a program for improvement. I’ve been working this one for about a month now and yep, I feel a lot better.
Want to know how to live to be 100? Try this one.
Ever had trouble getting behind eating a lot of fruits and vegetables despite how good they are for you? Ever had trouble selling that one to your kids and grandkids? Ever been totally sold on the idea then gone to the market and been totally tasered by the price of good health in some places? If your answer is yes to any or all of the above, you really need to check this site out. Fruits and veggies: more matters.
ONLINE TOOLS FOR THE KIT
Free People Search – This is an American online White Pages that I found really simple, quick and user friendly. I looked for myself under the several versions of my name and it found them all. It’s also free and doesn’t involve anything to download.
Know Thy Elected Officials - Just type in your zip code and this site will supply you with the names and contact information for your legislators from the state level up. This is a two click site with a host of other relevant features.
MEDIA
BBC – Best source for international news
Vinyl Cafe with Stuart McLean – Live from the smallest record store in North America. Canadian humor, entertainment and commentary at its maple leaf best. Popular on National Public Radio in the States.
Sightline Daily (formerly Tidepool) – The “United Press International/Reuters of the American West”. Updated and informative news shorts with links to the source. Its editors draw from a coverage area which includes Alaska, British Columbia, California, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington. They also put out an excellent weekly environmental edition.
U Got Style is a monthly ezine dedicated to independent films. Fully illustrated, it features hard news, interviews, reviews and a wide variety of other information. It’s also fun to read.
The Vancouver Sun -- outstanding source for Canadian and world news.
TALENT FOR HIRE
Rusty Miller, Freelance Photojournalist – Whether it’s a one time press release, book or product review, difficult business correspondence, resume or classified ad composition you need, take a look at the services offered menu on my writer-for-hire homepage and we’ll get together on it.
Are you a travel editor looking for color shots of Seattle? Are you an art dealer looking for new work to carry on consignment? You might enjoy checking out a gallery of my work for sale
Joe looks a lit-tle like Spiro Agnew, except that he keeps his hands in his own pockets. Unlike another vice president, Dick Cheney, Joe’s not a disciple of Prince Machiavelli and unlike Richard Nixon, he doesn’t have five o’clock shadow and I’ve never seen a photograph of him doing stupid things with a beagle. Oh and yeah, unlike Dan Quayle, Joe also appears to have mastered high school level spelling and grammar. So the fact that he’s a bit banal and off the scope doesn’t bother me.
I owe American Vice-President Joe Biden an apology, big time, and from now on, I’m paying more attention to him. He took a plan which originated in Berkeley, California and developed it on a national level. As San Francisco Chronicles reporter Carolyn Jones explains:
Biden's program, known as Recovery Through Retrofit, creates a framework for cities, counties and states to set up tax districts that allow residential and business property owners to install solar panels and make other energy improvements, repaying the investment over a 20-year property tax assessment.
Well, to no one’s surprise, I imagine, the swine flu is certainly impacting the way Americans live. I was in our local Safeway (chain grocery store) the other day and all of the checkers and baggers had blue surgical gloves on. A spokesperson for the store explained that there wasn’t really an official policy in place but that Safeway employees were encouraged to take appropriate steps to protect the health of themselves and their customers. The New York Times has a splendid and informational overview on this from a national perspective. Please go here.
The swine flu vaccine is now available to Canadians after Ottawa this week approved a strain of it for its citizens. Two million doses have already been shipped to the provinces and territories and two to three million a week will be distributed until the entire country is protected. Canada has a population of about 33-million.
Well, a study in Japan apparently proves that chimpanzees are capable of being nice to one another without being trained to do so. Researchers term the behavior “human-like altruism,” which sort of has me shaking my head a little. While I grant you that we are capable of considerable kindness to one another, we have also devised more ways to tease, taunt, insult, exploit, injure maim, torture, kill and annoy each other than any species – flora, fauna or hybrid – in the history of the planet and, I suspect the universe. So while I applaud the behaviour, I’m not quite up to slandering the chimpanzee by suggesting that compassion and generosity are necessarily intrinsic human traits. I suspect we learned such behaviour from high mountain gorillas, when the gorillas were in exceptionally good form.
If I didn’t live in a state whose unofficial “creature” is the banana slug, this second critter feature would tweak me a little. But in happened in Australia, where everything is upside down to begin with. Nine years ago, Tasmanian police investigated the scene of the robbery of a 71-year-old woman. At the scene they found a leech and extracted from it a sample of the blood it was engorged with for a DNA profile. When Peter Cannon was arrested on an unrelated crime last year, they took a sample of his DNA and lo and behold (I like saying that), the match placed him at the scene of that earlier crime and he pleaded guilty to it this week. Yep, I know. So check it out here. And yep, sounds like television series material to me; CSI Down Under and g’day, mate.
We mentioned last week that Vancouver, our sister city to the north, is preparing for a significant increase in electric cars thanks to a deal worked out with Nissan and endorsed by both Victoria and Ottawa. The U.S. federal government has decided to fund a project expected to put 1,000 quiet autos in the Puget Sound area and provide an “electric corridor” on Interstate Five from Eugene (mid-Oregon) to Vancouver, B.C., Canada. Washington was among five states involved in a study on the feasibility of “electrification” through a $100 million grant from the Department of Energy under the economic recovery program. For more about this one, please go here.
I used to live in Southern California back when smog and banal weather were still major pains in the psyche. One of the reasons I survived the last of my Navy enlistment and my university schooling down there was the Los Angeles Times and it’s “only the LAT could get away with this” headlines. This one got me going because I also like bicycles but I’m not a fanatic about them. I loved having one built for two and a significant other who loved to pedal. That meant that going uphill, I didn’t need to, and I’m sorry. I admit that’s not very cavalier but it is how my mind works. That’s the teaser. Check out the story here under “Electric bikes are all green (colors vary)”
And finally, since one of you asked me what I thought of that Colorado publicity junkie, his family and his balloon, I think he needs the services of a mental health professional and his kids a better paternal role model. I think that not only should he be required to pay back every cent of the cost of rescue, he should have to give all of us held spellbound and aching of heart by that particular dog and pony show $10 an hour for that monumental waste of time. I also think he should be required to spend 20 hours a week community service time over-dubbing Billy Mays infomercials. It’s creepy watching a dead guy promote stuff for $19.95 and this other jackass would make a nice addition to the weird team.
Well, that’s it for this week, folks. Take care, stay well and thanks once again for the ear.
Rusty
NORTHSTAR RECOMMENDS
TO YOUR HEALTH
If you’d like to know whether your eating habits are either adding years to your life or taking them off, take this RealAge quiz. It will not only score your real age against your health age but give you a program for improvement. I’ve been working this one for about a month now and yep, I feel a lot better.
Want to know how to live to be 100? Try this one.
Ever had trouble getting behind eating a lot of fruits and vegetables despite how good they are for you? Ever had trouble selling that one to your kids and grandkids? Ever been totally sold on the idea then gone to the market and been totally tasered by the price of good health in some places? If your answer is yes to any or all of the above, you really need to check this site out. Fruits and veggies: more matters.
ONLINE TOOLS FOR THE KIT
Free People Search – This is an American online White Pages that I found really simple, quick and user friendly. I looked for myself under the several versions of my name and it found them all. It’s also free and doesn’t involve anything to download.
Know Thy Elected Officials - Just type in your zip code and this site will supply you with the names and contact information for your legislators from the state level up. This is a two click site with a host of other relevant features.
MEDIA
BBC – Best source for international news
Vinyl Cafe with Stuart McLean – Live from the smallest record store in North America. Canadian humor, entertainment and commentary at its maple leaf best. Popular on National Public Radio in the States.
Sightline Daily (formerly Tidepool) – The “United Press International/Reuters of the American West”. Updated and informative news shorts with links to the source. Its editors draw from a coverage area which includes Alaska, British Columbia, California, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington. They also put out an excellent weekly environmental edition.
U Got Style is a monthly ezine dedicated to independent films. Fully illustrated, it features hard news, interviews, reviews and a wide variety of other information. It’s also fun to read.
The Vancouver Sun -- outstanding source for Canadian and world news.
TALENT FOR HIRE
Rusty Miller, Freelance Photojournalist – Whether it’s a one time press release, book or product review, difficult business correspondence, resume or classified ad composition you need, take a look at the services offered menu on my writer-for-hire homepage and we’ll get together on it.
Are you a travel editor looking for color shots of Seattle? Are you an art dealer looking for new work to carry on consignment? You might enjoy checking out a gallery of my work for sale
No comments:
Post a Comment