The Diet Blog has an interesting post about how BMI (body mass index measurements) have varied over the last century. They note that the mean BMI for U.S. females keeps going up. It was 28.1 in the 1990's and 24.9 in the 1960's. Yet in the modeling and celebrity world, the average BMI just keeps going down. Here's Kate Moss, who is said to have a BMI of 16. See their other examples of famous stars in each decade and their body types.
Today the sun was shining and had I had time to kill what to do... ...Retiro park!!
So off I go, armed with water, sandwiches, poi and juggling balls (and a Spanish phrase book), I arrive at the park and loads of people seem to have had the same idea the park is busy the sun is gorgeous and my tan is coming along far quicker than my Spanish.
After an hour of walking around taking in the sites - one of which is the only statue devoted to the devil! I sit down on the green reading my book watching the world go by - after working 4 weeks straight its a nice change of pace.
Of course I quickly get bored and start practising my poi and I now have learnt to juggle three balls after about an hours practise - I drop the balls often still but I have the hang of what needs to be done and I'm getting there.
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“You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone”, sang Joni Mitchell on her 1970 hit Big Yellow Taxi.
To which I would add “Or you’ve moved every single thing you own into the kitchen/bathroom/stacked it on the bed because you’re going to have your carpets cleaned because your upstairs neighbours flooded you (twice). Then dusted underneath it all because you always have to clean before the cleaners come. Then had to move it all again because the carpet cleaning firm double-booked you, and it would be quite nice to be able to, say, open the fridge door, use the toilet as its makers intended rather than performing a stunt defecation whilst precariously balanced on an upside-down swivel chair, or lie directly on the mattress as opposed to on a pile of sharp metal drawers. Even though you will never sleep well again, every night noise waking you in terror in case it sounded like something dripping through the ceiling again. Then moved it all back the next day to actually have the carpets cleaned. Then moved it all back again. You also know what you’ve got then.”
A World Of Thirst
A World of Thirst
Poor sanitation. Pollution. Wasteful irrigation. The planet's freshwater supply is terribly managed
By Bret Schulte
Posted 5/27/07
Over the course of the past 40 years, north Africa's Lake Chad has shriveled to one tenth its earlier size, beset by decades of drought and agricultural irrigation that have sucked water from the rivers that feed it—even as the number of people whose lives depend on its existence has grown. In 1990, the Lake Chad basin supported about 26 million people; by 2004 the total was 37.2 million. In the next 15 years, experts predict, the incredible shrinking lake and its tapped rivers will need to support 55 million. "You don't have much room for error at this point," says hydrologist Michael Coe.
The population growth has coincided with a 25 percent decrease in rainfall, with global warming very likely a factor. As oceans store more heat, the temperature difference between water and land dissipates, sapping power from rainmaking monsoons. At the same time, desperate people are overusing wells. Coe recently concluded that water supplies in the basin are "stretched to their limits, and future needs will far outstrip the accessible supply."
Lake Chad, with its confluence of troubles, is emblematic of a burgeoning water crisis around the world. While the western United States faces serious water problems, American money and know-how can at least soften the blow. Not so elsewhere. Worldwide, 1.1 billion people lack clean water, 2.6 billion people go without sanitation, and 1.8 million children die every year because of one or the other, or both. By 2025, the United Nations predicts 3 billion people will be scrambling for clean water. There are myriad problems: industrial contaminants flooding waterways, wasteful irrigation, an exploding world population, political corruption and incompetence, and a changing climate—to name a few.
In a report issued in November, the United Nations declared water "a global crisis," announcing that 55 member nations are failing to meet their water-related Millennium Development Goal target, agreed upon in 2000, of halving the proportion of people without clean water and sanitation by 2015. The real crisis, experts say, is not a lack of water but a lack of water management. Water doesn't always appear in the right places, or at the right times. And it has to be cared for. "It's a terrible situation around the world," says Peter Rogers, a Harvard environmental engineering professor, "but it doesn't have to be."
One percent. Just 3 percent of the world's water is fresh. Of that, most is locked in the ground, glaciers, or ice caps. That leaves about 1 percent for the world's 6.6 billion people. As population grows, so does demand for water—but at two to three times the rate. People consume water for drinking, for hygiene, through food production, and in a variety of industrial processes. A blossoming middle class in Southeast Asia, India, and China will join the West in consuming far more than the minimum 20 to 50 liters (about five to 13 gallons) of water per day necessary per person. (Americans lead the world by consuming 400 to 600 liters per day, or as much as 158 gallons.) Upward mobility has yielded more flush toilets and a dietary shift from grain to meat-heavy diets. Raising a cow requires a thousand times more water than the equivalent average for grain.
End of excerpt.
Much more at the link. And it is good to see articles on this important topic for all of our lives being printed in publications like U.S. News And World Report. We need to see more of this.
Sally has lost 20 pounds by starting a modest running program and watching her diet. When she started jogging ten weeks ago, she could only run for about 90 seconds at a stretch. She's now surprised she can do half an hour. Her abs are starting to show, just based on the the regular jogging exercise.
She's been following the Couch to 5k (or 'couch to three miles') program. This shows you how to ease into running gradually. It recommends walking and jogging at first for 20 to 30 minutes three times a week. The objective of the program is to enable you to run three miles at a stretch in just two months.
As far as her food intake goes, she's made no strict rules, she is just trying to eat lots of vegetables and to deal with the cravings.
The above poster is a woman running through the desert landscape by Dugald Bremner.
The other day a friend and I were talking about flashmobbing and today I found this story and thought it only right to share! Andy keep em peeled they may be in a town near you!!!
A horde of decaying zombies invaded San Francisco's downtown Apple store on Friday evening, hunting for brains, terrifying the customers, and gnawing on iMacs. It was difficult to judge the exact number of zombies that shuffled through the city's shopping district, losing limbs, blood, and unmentionable body parts along the way, but probably at least 150 converged on Union Square.
Then they decided to visit nearby businesses, including the Apple store, Nordstrom, the Disney store, and the Westfield Mall.The event was titled "SF Zombie Mob 2007," and it was organized by the gruesome-minded folks at eatbrains.com. It's akin to a flash mob, though because the participants trek around the city after gathering, the Zombie Mob was closer in concept to the Critical Mass bicycle ride, which coincidentally was happening at the same time along the same street.
In truth, it was a pretty polite affair: only passers-by who volunteered to become zombie-fied were, and no arrests took place.It may be worth noting that the Westfield Mall and Disney security tried to bar the zombies from entering, but Apple store security did not.
In fact, salespeople were jostling one another for a position where they could take the best photo of the zombies (or themselves with the zombies, or their brains being eaten by the zombies).
see the photos for yourself http://www.mccullagh.org/theme/zombie-flash-mob-2007.html
Bottled Water Has High Environmental Costs
By Deborah Zabarenko, Environment Correspondent
WASHINGTON, May 10 (Reuters) - Bottled water, the world's fastest growing beverage, carries a heavy environmental cost, adding plastic to landfills and putting pressure on natural springs, the author of a new report said on Thursday.
"Bottled water is really expensive, in terms of environmental costs and economically," said Ling Li, who wrote the report for the Washington-based Worldwatch Institute.
While many in developed countries thirst for safety, cleanliness, taste and social cachet when they buy bottled water, more than 1 billion of the world's poorest lack access to clean drinking water, bottled or not.
And in developed countries, bottled water may be scrutinized using lower standards than plain tap water, the report said.
The environmental impact can start at the source, where some local streams and underground aquifers become depleted when there is "excessive withdrawal" for bottled water, according to the report.
In addition to the energy cost of producing, bottling, packaging, storing and shipping bottled water, there is also the environmental cost of the millions of tonnes of oil-derived plastic needed to make the bottles.
"The beverage industry benefits the most from our bottled water obsession," Ling said in a statement. "But this does nothing for the staggering number of the world's poor who see safe drinking water as at best a luxury and at worst an unattainable goal."
Worldwatch estimated 35 to 50 percent of urban dwellers in Africa and Asia lack adequate access to safe potable water.
Most water is bottled in polyethylene terephthalate, or PET, which requires less energy to recycle and does not release chlorine into the atmosphere when burned. But recycling rates have declined: about 23.1 percent of PET water bottles were recycled in the United States in 2005, compared with 39.7 percent 10 years earlier, the report said.
Bottled water costs from 240 to 10,000 times as much as water straight from the tap. In dollars, that means such water sold in most industrialized countries costs $500 to $1,000 per 1 cubic metre (35.3 cu ft), compared with 50 cents per cubic metre in California, where the quality of tap water is high.
World consumption of bottled water more than doubled between 1997 and 2005, with the United States being the largest consumer. U.S. residents drank nearly 6.3 billion gallons (28.6 billion litres) in 2005, the report found.
Among the countries that use bottled water, India's consumption nearly tripled for the period, and China's more than doubled between 2000 and 2005. Mexico, Brazil, Italy, Germany, France, Indonesia and Spain round out the top 10.
~~~~~~~~~~
Corporations that sell bottled water are depleting natural resources, inflating prices, and lying when they tell you their water is purer and tastes better than the water that comes out of the tap. And Americans have been the unwitting targets of a grand campaign to make them believe that tap water is always substandard and bottled is always from a pristine flowing stream in the mountains of Maine untouched by man... and the reason for that deception should not be surprising...PROFITS.
In the past ten years the bottled water market has more than doubled in the United States becoming the second most popular beverage behind soda. Three out of four Americans drink bottled water, and spent $10 billion on bottled water last year alone which comes to an average of about 26 gallons per person. That's a lot of environmental degradation and landfill plastic just to have convenience and feel "safe" about a product that for the most part is no different than the water coming out of your tap.
Just as with the tobacco industy and the oil industy, the bottled water industry is spending tens of millions of dollars every year to undermine your confidence in tap water even though the water systems we rely on are better regulated than the bottled water industry. Tap water is regulated by the EPA which has strict guidelines regarding chemicals with testing by government agencies. Bottled water is regulated by the FDA with regulations that only apply to water that is bottled and transported between states. That leaves out a huge chunk of the water transported within states that have no guidelines attached to them with states many times leaving them to self police themselves.
Three companies control more than half the water market presently: Coca-Cola, Pepsi, and Nestle. Both Coke and Pepsi exclusively use tap water for their source while Nestle uses tap water in some brands, and even though they make claims that it is filtered several times with the processes they use it is hardly state of the art and prone to the same dangers as any other product and people are paying dearly for it. These companies harm the environment by depleting underground water sources and damaging stream systems by using affiliate companies to bottle the water for a song as they mark it up exhorbitantly to make a profit. This while people in water scarce countries literally die of thirst. To me, this practice is totally immoral. That is because this misrepresentation about tap water prohibits proper funds from being alloted to update water systems, thus opening the door up to privitization. And that is something people must fight as those in Cochabamaba Bolivia did in 2000 when Bechtel sought to privitize their water.
The first step of course is to have water declared a global human right, and for people to become more aware of just what entity is overseeing their water system. At the frantic pace of population, the excelled pace of resources dwindling including glacier melt that is happening at an accelerated rate globally and drought due to climate change, and the continued wasteful practices of humans, we are headed for a crisis of untold proportions if we do not get a handle on it now. And that also means standing up to those who would dare use this crisis as a way to make a profit from it as people in developing countries dig ever deeper hoping for just one drink a day.
People are being hoodwinked into giving huge amounts of money to an industry that takes advantage of our environment and brings in more profits than the pharmaceutical industry. One hundred billion dollars could have done a lot to bring potable water to the over one billion people in this world now without it and fix the water systems here that need it.
Water is not a commodity it is a human right. It is time those companies exploiting that right know that we are not going to take it anymore.
My other writings on this:
Stand Up To Corporations That Kill
Globalization/Time To Take Action
Who Owns The Water?
There's a good article today at NPR about the causes and cures for Type 2 diabetes. A large study has found that exercise and diet are more effective than drugs in preventing and reversing diabetes. The people in the study exercised for 2.5 hours a week.
They say that the high incidence of younger people getting diabetes is very alarming. It used to be only older people who were at risk.
See more about the benefits of exercise and diet in reversing diabetes here.
Janet Jackson lost 60 pounds a year ago. At that time she was on the cover of US Weekly and that magazine cover sold more copies than any other issue in the magazine's history.
So now, one year later, US Weekly has Jackson on the cover again. This time the feat is no less newsworthy. Jackson has managed to keep the weight off for the year and she looks even fitter than last year. Jackson, age 41 says she now weighs 120 pounds. 
Jackson's weight loss in 2006 was probably the most dramatic celebrity makeover of the year.
Janet credits Fresh Dining with helping her lose the weight.
Well, this week I'm back in Gredos not because I'm in charge of another program, but because I cant afford to be in Madrid without money, so I'm freeloading and helping out Rob (also picking up more invaluable tips).
The program is going really well, and yet again many friends were made as the week progressed. I was fortunate enough to see a very good friend come totally out of himself and grow into a star! Matt was on my first program and I managed to be with him through all three of his consecutive programs, it was a pleasure to know him and share the experience - I wish you all the best in the future and really hope our paths cross again; Dark Knight!
There was karaoke on Tuesday night after the Quemada; there was a small after party (so I hear, cough cough). I'm actually trying to learn to sing so a great opportunity for me to rock, the big party was on Thursday night which wrapped up early for me at least - then the folowing morning hit with mess in one of the rooms - what do you do!?!?
The weather wasn't on our side though last week and we had to make the best of it, which I'm glad to say we did. We tried out some new ideas for sketches and activities and Rob performed some sketches which he has now retired as he likes to keep things fresh (as do i).
We had quite a few "veterans" (people who had done the program before), on this program so it was good to keep it fresh for them, but after spending SO much time with them and getting to know them personally it does make it hard when they leave.
As usual the hardest part is the goodbyes - knowing we may never see these people again; and not so hairy Rob is camping in the wilderness so who knows what will become of him!?!?
If the weather holds out; which it wont & if the bears dont get him; and they might & if he survives the snakes; which I doubt: we may see him at some point, if not his legend will live on in Gredos Mountains!
Back in Madrid - I made a big error not booking a hostel, so unable to get anywhere to stay as everywhere was fully booked, after checking 12 places finally got one! I wont make that mistake again, he says.
We had one last crazy night in Madrid - met "RANDOM GUY" which we dubbed him for the night, had a real giggle and managed to get home, which was a bonus!
Well all the photos will be uploaded as usual for you to see what im up to and what ive been upto. Next week very busy sorting out, banks, NIE and somewhere to finally call home I have a week to sort it all - wish me luck; im gonna need it!
click to see PHOTOS - may the force be with you!!!!
BTW: when applying for a room I found this line in the ad - property with a view of the moon through window!! now that's amazing salesmanship - sea view is one thing but a moon view!! Just think what we could do to property prices with sun and moon views!!
Our friend Ryanne has been asking us for an easy way to add an image to her blog’s header for a few months now. When we added the feature a few weeks back, she was excited enough to create a screencast to teach everyone how to do it:
Also, a plug: Blogger is sponsoring Pixelodeon, a vlogging conference Ryanne is co-organizing, happening June 9th and 10th in Los Angeles, CA. A few of us from Blogger will be attending - go there!
The sun is shining today.
They were mowing the grass on the Green this morning and there was that definite smell of ‘summer’ in the air…
That (and having just chatted to Dade) has put me in a great mood!
I'm not holding out hopes that it’ll last too long (the weather that is!), but I am enjoying it for today….
I have had a hectic week since my last post…
Tuesday night I worked at the restaurant.
Wednesday night I caught up with David, a friend I worked with at Sky in NZ, who was over in London for 3 days (he’s doing a 7 week tour of Europe = intensely jealous!), I also had a farewell party for someone from work, so we went along to that, then we had a quick late dinner (to soak up the alcohol!) and then went and visited a mate of his at Sky here.
Thursday night I had a much needed night in, trying to organise my life.
Friday night I worked at the restaurant again.
Saturday and Sunday I worked day shifts at the restaurant. The bonus was this weekend, I had both nights off! YAY!
Ellen braved the public transport system and ventured into London and we had a good catch up over wine and dinner on Saturday night.
Last night I tried to have an early night, even went to bed about 8.30! But got so engrossed in the book I was reading I ended up still awake at 2am!!
Hey ho!! … its all go but those of you who know me personally, know I like to be busy!!
I’ve got a few things planned this week, including attending a music video filming as part of the onscreen audience but will leave you in suspense about it all so you have something to read about later!
Until then, always remember… “When making your choices in life, do not neglect to live.”
When I am not complaining about the long winter evenings I am complaining that at this time of year the sun wakes me up too early. I am probably only happy for two days out of 365 – around the vernal and autumnal equinoxes. And only then if the weather is good.
So I decided to fit a blackout blind in our bedroom to help me sleep until the Seasonal Affected Disorder kicks in again. Miraculously, the made-to-my-measurements blind fitted, and when I put it up it not only stayed up, it also blocked out about 99.999% of the daylight. Could this plan have worked?
I went to the bathroom in the middle of last night. When I came back it was so dark that I stubbed my toe on the bed. Now I'm really unhappy.
You can help us out and make money just by using Blogger! From time to time at Blogger we run usability studies to make sure that we’re on the right track with all the new features we’re working on.
If playing with Blogger for an hour or so and making up to $100 sounds like something you’d like to do, please sign up here. Have more questions? Read the FAQ. You don’t even have to live near Mountain View, CA to participate.
Karen Ebbesmeyer weighed 275 pounds two years ago. That's when she got started on the Weight Watchers program as well as walking on a treadmill at least three miles a day.
She says she eats a lot more vegetables now. Before starting the diet, she says that if she opened one can of vegetables a week she was doing good.
Karen now weighs just under 150 pounds. She's gone from a size 24 to a size 6 and is flying to New York this week to do a photoshoot for Good Housekeeping magazine. She'll be featured in their August issue.
See the full story here.
Well the time has finally arrived to earn my wings. Having been on two programs with both Masters and watched them work, it was time to put my money were my mouth is and prove I was worthy.
As usual it was an early start (did I ever mention I hate mornings?) however even earlier as we had further to travel as we set off for San Zoila - It was a long day, preparing scripts and activities for the group - this all goes on behind the scenes then I try to make it look as smooth as possible, lol.
I took the chance to get to know the group a little, it was a rather nice mix of ages and personalities which helped settle my nerves. I finished my final touches to scripts etc, and then encouraged people to participate in them - well when I say encouraged (I had a role that only THEY could do), which got them to perform; result! This was a great group that seemed up for whatever was asked of them and I was happy about that.
On Monday night we had a few sketches, a relaxation technique by Janelle (a very sweet Aussie) some magic from myself and Simon (another Aussie; far too talented for my liking, lol) rocked into the night on his guitar.
Tuesday was hectic with three sketch's and props to organise as well as me having to at least attempt to outdo Simon (that Aussie guy I mentioned), with even more impressive magic! Tuesday seemed a strange day with only a smattering of applause; not sure if they didn't get the sketches or what?
Wednesday was far better - maybe the ear was opening up now for the Spaniards because they seemed to get most everything this time. There was an AWESOME improv sketch, a mind gym exercise and Simon (the Aussie; said through gritted teeth) had yet again managed to upstage me with his singing and playing skills the night before - so I conceded and decided to teach him and the audience a trick! Well when I say that a trick took place and they had no idea how - but Simon was the Magi in this instance so earnt the credit, which he deserved as he perfectly ad libbed his way through the act.
Thursday nice easy day, trip to town all was going well; TOO WELL!!!! After spending a good three hours putting together a play list for the party to please as many people as possible, I plugged in my hard drive only to hear it POP!! The electrics blew my hard drive - no party!!!
So faced with the dilemma what to do I put the options to the group and like the true group they had become they rallied together using Ipod's to ensure the party went as well as it could be; and it was good! It was also good to see the spirit of the group come together like that.
Friday - tearful goodbyes and photos galore as we all head back to our lives, I do hope this time people will keep in touch, but it is hard for all concerned. Either way it has once again been a pleasure meeting and getting to know a group of total strangers with one objective learning English.
All in all I was very pleased with the results of the program and very happy with what I had managed to achieve and learn - the group also thought so, as they gave me a standing ovation at the end of the ceremony (just to see me cry, dam them!!!)
As usual I have posted photos HERE
Epicurious recently interviewed Susan Wyler. Wyler has helped Dr. Rau write The Swiss Secret to Optimal Health: Dr. Rau's Diet for Whole Body Healing.
SW: I went on [the detox diet] in preparation for meeting with Dr. Rau. Beforehand, I had the usual allergies and common problems associated with postmenopausal women. I was the queen of "eat as much as you can get away with of everything that tastes good." I wanted to see if, as a "foodie," I could recommend anyone eat like a chipmunk for three weeks and not get depressed. The difference I felt on the diet was dramatic — it had to be for me to become convinced.
Epi: What sort of changes have you seen in your body?
SW: I was never able to get out of bed in the morning. Morning was excruciating. No more. I wake up bright and energetic. I've lost 12 pounds, a lot for a woman of my small height. Bouts of depression, which occasionally visited me on and off for years, have disappeared. What thrilled me the most was the improvement in my thyroid condition. I had been on Synthroid for an unsightly neck goiter, but after eight months on the diet, it just melted away. When tested, my thyroid function had improved 25 percent.
Today we're adding autosaving of draft posts to the Blogger post editor. Now you don't have to feel so bad about browser crashes, random laptop restarts, or that hamster vs. gerbil war going on behind your desk that keeps knocking your power cord out of the socket, because Blogger is automatically saving as you type! It's doing it to me right now. Even if I...
*smash*
Whoops! I just pretended that my browser crashed for the purpose of illustrating that the above paragraph is still intact, thanks to autosave! So say "goodbye" to lost blog posts. You won't miss them.
As you work on a new or draft post in the Blogger post editor, the page will periodically send a copy of the text, title, labels, etc. to our servers. We do this about once a minute, unless you type a lot, in which case we'll save as soon as you stop typing, just to be on the safe side. You'll know it's happening because the "Save Now" button at the bottom of the page will turn into a gray "Saved" button.
We'll autosave new posts (they'll become drafts) as well as draft posts that you edit. We won't autosave posts that are currently published, since you don't want your readers to see your updates while you're working on them.
On top of this, we're revamping the post editor's keyboard shortcuts to make them a bit more sane. Now Ctrl-P publishes, Ctrl-S saves a draft, and Ctrl-D switches from published to draft. We moved Preview over to Ctrl-Shift-P.
Most people don't see themselves as potential heart attack or stroke victims. But it happens to many of us after age 40 and especially after age 55.
If one of the following risk factors applies to you, then it could be very helpful to look into heart health tips sooner rather than later;
* High blood pressure
* High blood cholesterol
* Diabetes
* Smoking
* Being overweight
* Being physically inactive
* Having a family history of early heart disease
* Age (55 or older for women)
The National Heart, Blood and Lung Institute has a 122 page handbook about heart health that you can download for free, or get a copy sent to you for $3.75. It's The Healthy Heart Handbook for Women '07.
Now that Blogger's on fresh, solid ground, our engineering team is cranking full-steam ahead on lots of exciting new features! But we've got a classic problem that comes with growth - there's too much to do, and too few people to do it all.
Therefore, we're looking to hire some UI experts (both visual and interaction designers, as well as software engineers) to join the Blogger Team here at Google, and help us plan and build Blogger's next generation features. If you're interested, send an email to jobs@blogger.com with your resumé, and which of the following job descriptions you're interested in:
Warming Triggers Alarming Retreat of Himalayan Glaciers
Excerpt:
Glacial runoff in the Himalayas is the largest source of freshwater for northern India, and provides more than half the water to its most important river, the Ganges.
Glacial runoff also is the source of the headwaters for the Indus River in Pakistan, the Brahmaputra that flows through Bangladesh, the Mekong that descends through Southeast Asia, the Irrawaddy in Burma, and the Yellow and Yangtze rivers of China.
Scientists say 1.3 billion people reside in areas affected by glacial retreat, either in flood-prone areas or in locales that rely on year-round supplies of fresh water from glaciers rather than from the monsoon rainfall of only three or four months.
The retreating glaciers are occurring across an area that's the largest high-altitude land mass on the planet, bordered by the Himalayas to the south, the Tian Shan range to the north, and the Pamirs and the Karakorum mountains to the west.
Throughout the area, experts say, dwindling glaciers may lead to unstable mountainsides, greater sedimentation in rivers and disrupted irrigation systems, in addition to threatening water supplies to large populations.
China issued its first ever report on climate change in late December, saying average temperatures will rise two to three degrees Fahrenheit by 2020 and up to 6.4 degrees by the end of the century, unleashing more frequent "extreme weather events."
Scientists say glacial retreat will bring a feast-or-famine cycle to the Himalayas.
In the near term, accelerated glacial melting will bring a bonanza of water flow, perhaps even intense flooding, with great impact on biodiversity.
"The flooding events will scour the species that live in the river areas," said Dr. Lara Hansen, chief scientist for the global climate change program at the World Wildlife Fund. High-altitude plants and animals that are highly dependent on the glacial melt during the non-rainy season also will be affected, she added.
As climate change intensifies, she said, humans growing desperate for year-round water are likely to pay less attention to the needs of protecting biodiversity.
Small villages in Nepal, Bhutan, India and Pakistan that rely on glacier-fed water "are already feeling the pinch of this," Kulkarni said.
Far from the highest peaks in Tibet, large lakes fed by glacial runoff are rising by as much as 30 feet, experts said, submerging new areas and displacing some nomads. Experts say permafrost, or perennially frozen ground, is also beginning to melt.
"Sometimes when we camp out, we see water seeping up from the tent floor," said Bendo, a senior engineer with Remote Sensing Application Research Center of the Tibet Autonomous Region, who goes by only one name.
The Himalayas, with 17 percent glacial cover, have far more extensive glaciers than other ranges, such as the Alps, which have only a 2 percent cap of glacier and icepack.
End of excerpt
Photo Slideshow/The Roof Of The World Is Melting
MSNBC has an encouraging article about reducing cellulite with exercise. They interviewed Wayne Westcott, a fitness research director. He has found that women who are not exercising and begin a program of exercise three times a week, together with a reduced-calorie diet can lose on average about 9 pounds of fat and gain two pounds of muscle in about eight weeks. Most of these women also said they thought the cellulite on their thighs and hips showed improvement.
Cellulite is more likely to appear if you don't have good muscle tone.
Cellulite is a drag. And even celebrities get cellulite.
It has been a busy few days. On top of the tail end of our building work, I have had to mop up leaks, move half our furniture to pull up carpets, and also deal with insurance companies, neighbours and tradesmen who may or may not have any liability insurance. As well as have discussions with script editors about why it is OK to show a cartoon character's head being blown off on children's television, but another character simply dying is a bit odd. (I agreed with him, but couldn't quite put my finger on why.)
I was absolutely starving last night (my girlfriend is not around to cook for me on Tuesdays and Thursdays), so I just put a frozen ready meal in the oven and set about my last job – writing a letter to Homebase explaining why they are idiots.
It was a long letter (of the five things that I ordered from them, one was missing, one was scratched and two were just completely wrong – to be fair to them the shower screen is great, so well done on the 20% customer satisfaction rating), but just as I was signing off with a flourish of hate-filled invective the oven beeped. Perfect timing – everything in the flat was being sorted out, and now I could cue up a recorded Grand Designs (always nice to see other people having a worse time than me), get out a lap tray and relax.
I prodded the lasagne. Something was not quite right about it. I am not a very good cook, but even I can tell the difference between “piping hot” and “still frozen”. I peered inside the fan oven. As far as I could tell it seemed to be doing only 50% of its job description. I couldn't fault the “fan”-ing side of things, but there was definite room for improvement in the “oven”-ing area. It is a while since I studied thermodynamics, but I'm pretty sure that my meal would be past its use by date long before I managed to cook it by blowing cold air at it.
I put down my knife and fork, switched off the television and looked up the phone numbers of a takeaway and an oven repairers.
Whilst floating around the net I stumbled upon this beauty - very clever indeed. Still if you spot what happening.
How cool was that - did you spot the changes? I didn't get all of them either, just goes to show sometimes you simply don't pay attention.
Last night I went to the Mika concert at the Shepherd’s Bush Empire. I believe it was only his 4th gig and it was absolutely fantastic! He is such an energetic performer and really got the crowd going. Here are some (admittedly not very good) photos from the show.
|  | Get Your Own! |
Well another weekend passed working at the restaurant – worked 4 shifts over three days, bringing my total of hours outside my main job to 26… got home to discover my housemates up in arms over some pettiness about not sharing milk and missing slices of bread and today it is raining in London… I am starting to wonder what I am still doing here?
This thought was reinforced even more when I received an email this morning from one of my aunties, who is living in Thailand. A retired home-ec teacher, she moved out there at the start of this year to teach invaluable quilting skills to some very poor villagers so they could support themselves and earn their own incomes. She’s been filling us in on her adventures with monthly updates, and her stories are not only making me jealous, and stirring up the travel bug in me again, but also making me feel like my job and life here are so meaningless at the moment, when there is so much more of the world still to see and so many people of the world I could really make a difference too…
It’s all making me think, what am I waiting for? Why bide my time here, albeit reluctantly, when I could act now and put some meaning and direction back into my life.
The easier and most honest answer is money, and the ability, or inability to earn it elsewhere. Shame really, that money does make the world go round. But I have been in worse positions before and there are definitely a lot more people in the world far worse off than I am… And sometimes you do really need to spend a bit to make a bit, and believe in yourself and take that leap of faith. I have a few thoughts in mind, routes to investigate, and leads to follow up…
So watch this space, as movement shortly is more than inevitable now…
Chick peas, also known as garbanzo beans, are together with the whole legume family, one of the best foods you can eat for weight loss.
One cup of garbanzo beans will provide you with 50% of the fiber amount recommended for daily consumption. The high fiber prevents blood sugar levels from rising too rapidly after a meal, this being especially good for anyone with diabetes, insulin resistance or hypoglycemia.
Garbanzo beans are an excellent source of the trace mineral molybdenum which helps detoxify sulfites. Sulfites are a preservative that is often added to prepared foods such as deli salads and salad bars.
The insoluble fiber found in garbanzo beans helps to make your stools bigger and to prevent constipation, irritable bowel syndrome and diverticulosis.
A cup of garbanzo beans has amazing nutritional benefits. Of the daily recommended values of key nutrients, it provides 70% of folate, 50% of fiber, 29% of protein, 26% of iron, 84% of magnamese and 164% of molybdenum. All for 269 calories.
See the excellent overview of chick pea health benefits here.
See the recipe for the Garbanzo bean salad above here.
A:
“I say, I say, I say. What is the secret of comedy?”
“I don’t know, what is the secret of com...”
“Timing!”
B:
Comedy = Tragedy + Time
What the above means is that one day I will be able to laugh about the fact that my upstairs neighbours flooded my flat (twice) the week after I finished decorating the kitchen and having a new bathroom fitted, rather than the week before I started.
One day.
I’m pencilling in 2017.
A bleached "bathtub ring," the result of a six-year drought that has dramatically dropped the level of the reservoir, shows on red Navajo sandstone formations near Last Chance Bay at Lake Powell near Page, Ariz. Lake Powell and the next biggest Colorado River reservoir, the nearly 100-year-old Lake Mead, are at the lowest levels ever recorded.
David Mcnew / Getty Images
Southwest Water Woes
You can listen to the radio program at a link at the original link noted above. Here is part of the transcript:
There’s been a drought in the Southwestern U.S. since 1998, but that hasn’t stopped the population in the region from rising by a million people per year. Brian Mann reports on the Colorado River’s struggle to meet growing water demands in the Southwest:
CURWOOD: It's Living on Earth. I'm Steve Curwood. Every day, it seems, thousands of Americans pack up for the sunny skies of the Southwest, especially the booming cities of Las Vegas and Phoenix. The Southwest is a desert, of course, but thanks to the massive water projects of the 1930's it became hospitable for millions of settlers. But now there's trouble in the Southwest. The region is suffering through its eighth year of drought with little or no relief in sight. For much of its water the Southwest relies on the Colorado River to brings snowmelt from the Rocky Mountains. But snow patterns are changing and the Colorado is carrying a lot less water than it did a century ago. Overall it seems global warming is hitting the region harder than just about anywhere else in the country
Brian Mann of North Country Public Radio has our story.
snip
MANN: Seventy-five years later, big crowds of tourists squeeze through the dam's visitor center.
ANNOUNCER: Come on in, folks, Find a place where you can see!
MANN: This may be one of the world's modern engineering marvels. But tour guide Bruce Laughlin, who works for the Federal Bureau of Reclamation, acknowledges that the Colorado River's great reservoirs -- at Lake Powell and here at Lake Mead -- were built for much wetter times. For nearly a decade, they've been drying up.
LAUGHLIN: I think we're about 54%.
TOURIST: How long since it's been full?
LAUGHLIN: This lake was filled right to the top before this drought started in 1998. This coming year, they're going to hold as much water as they can in the upper lake because they need to fill up Lake Powell, because it's getting dangerously low. This lake's probably gonna go down more.
MANN: Scientists now believe that the West was settled during an unusually wet period. The people who built these reservoirs had unrealistic expectations for how much rain and snow would fall each year. Recent climate models predict further drying, less precipitation for the Southwest.
GLEICK: If nature gives us a little less water, then there just is not enough to go around.
MANN: Peter Gleick is a water expert at an environment and resources think tank in Oakland, California called the Pacific Institute.
GLEICK: It turns out that a very small decrease in average flow of the Colorado, in the long run, drains those reservoirs dry.
MANN: A new study by the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University -- published in the journal Science -- focused on predictions for the Southwest. Atmospheric scientist and lead researcher Richard Seager says he expects precipitation in the region to drop by 10-20 percent before mid-century. Meanwhile the population of the Southwest is still growing by roughly a million people a year.
SEAGER: With declining water availability there's going to be quite a tussle about who gets the water and whether it's going to be possible to reallocate water in a way that will retain agriculture that's needed, but also sustain a growing urban population.
MANN: Rising temperatures are already shrinking the mountain snow pack, which feeds Western rivers through the summer. In the future, by summer's end, there may be no more snow to melt.
SEAGER: So that natural system of water storage that the water supply system is relying on is going to become less effective.
MANN: Water experts say these incremental changes could disrupt the Colorado River's complicated system of dams, reservoirs and allocation treaties that now supply water to 25 million people.
MULROY: What resources we do have, given what global warming could present to us, could evaporate tomorrow.
MANN: Patricia Mulroy is general manager of the Southern Nevada Water Authority, which is charged with supplying water to the city of Las Vegas.
MULROY: I do believe that the Colorado River is going to be severely challenged as we go through global warming. We're already behind in developing those alternatives on how to protect human existence in the West.
MANN: Conservation is a necessity. And some fast-growing cities have implemented water-use restrictions unheard of in water-rich parts of the U.S. Denver and Aurora, Colorado are seen as models -- as is Tucson, Arizona. Here in Las Vegas, there are actually water detectives, who sniff out waste.
snip
MANN: The Water Authority has combined this kind of enforcement with new incentives, urging people to convert from grass and shrubs to desert plants and rock gardens. But critics say the city isn't doing nearly enough. Down on Vegas's casino strip, there is water everywhere -- flowing from extravagant fountains, gushing over manmade waterfalls.
[WATER SOUNDS]
MANN: Outside the Venetian, one of Vegas's showcase casinos, gondolas ferry tourists through glittering canals. This water is re-circulated and reused, but Jill Rowland-Legan says it's a symbol of the city's outdated thinking.
LEGAN: Are they being smart about growth? Should they have some type of moratorium on growth until we get this water issue taken care of? Are they still catering to the major casinos and the major contractors?
MANN: Jill Rowland-Legan heads the chamber of commerce in Boulder City, a small town that lies between Las Vegas Vegas and the Lake Mead reservoir. Her community has embraced a slow-growth ordinance that limits new home construction.
LEGAN: We don't even take our complete allocation of water here in Boulder City because it's all going to Vegas to make sure that they're taken care of.
MANN: But Patricia Mulroy, with the Southern Nevada Water Authority, says slowing Las Vega's growth is not an option. Construction cranes punctuate the horizon. With eight thousand new residents arriving every month, neighborhoods push steadily toward the arid hills.
MULROY: Every piece of private land is acquired with an expectation to not leave it desert, but to build on it. And the private property owner has a right to develop his property.
MANN: Eighty percent of the Colorado River's water is still used for agriculture and Mulroy says that has to change. The Water Authority has already begun buying up farms and ranches in rural Nevada, in a bid to control more water rights.
But as the drought deepens, Columbia University researcher Richard Seager says rain and snowfall in this region will decline to levels not experienced since the Dust Bowl of the 1930s. Only this time, the dry spell won't end.
SEAGER: That level of reduction was enough to cause really severe trouble and that level of reduction persisting for an even longer period of time will equally cause a lot of trouble.
For Living On Earth I'm Brian Mann in Las Vegas, Nevada.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It is always the same. People moving to the desert to swim in their pools, water their desert lawns, and live a life in excess not thinking about the future. Well, the future is here and it isn't looking so good unless those people wake up and think about something other than themselves. It sometimes is as simple as that.
Weather patterns are changing and temperatures are warming due to the climate crisis we face. That means as we are seeing, that snowpack that feeds the rivers will be no more if the current level is sustained and what is left will have to be allocated amicably and equitably with a rising population. Just how do people propose that will happen without tensions? How will people be able to live with most of the water being used in agriculture? You think what has happened in Australia can't happen here in the U.S.? Think again. It has already started.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Scientists Predict Southwest Mega Drought
WASHINGTON - Changing climate will mean increasing drought in the American Southwest — a region where water already is in tight supply — according to a new study.
“The bottom line message for the average person and also for the states and federal government is that they’d better start planning for a Southwest region in which the water resources are increasingly stretched,” said Richard Seager of Columbia University’s Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory. Seager is lead author of the study published online Thursday by the journal Science.
Researchers studied 19 computer models of the climate, using data dating back to 1860 and projecting into the future, to the year 2100. The same models were used in preparing the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
The consensus of the models was that climate in the southwestern United States and parts of northern Mexico began a transition to drier conditions late in the 20th century and is continuing the trend in this century, as climate change alters the movement of storms and moisture in the atmosphere. The models show the drying trend continuing all the way to 2100 — for more than 90 years.
"If these models are correct, the levels of aridity of the recent multiyear drought, or the Dust Bowl and 1950s droughts, will, within the coming years to decades, become the new climatology of the American Southwest," the researchers wrote.
In a telephone interview, Seager said that doesn’t mean there would be dust storms like those of the 1930s Dust Bowl, because conditions at that time were also complicated by poor agricultural practices. But he said the reduction in rainfall could be equivalent to those times when thousands of farmers abandoned their parched land and moved away in search of jobs.
Currently, the majority of water in the Southwest is used in agriculture, but the urban population of the region is growing and so the water needs of people are growing as well, he explained.
“So, in a case where there is a reduced water supply, there will have to be some reallocation between the users,” Seager said. “The water available is already fully allocated.” He said feels that adjustments can be made to deal with the change, perhaps by withdrawing some land from production and by conserving water in urban areas. “But it’s something that needs to be planned for,” Seager said. “It’s time to start thinking how to deal with that.”
Jonathan T. Overpeck, director of the Institute for the Study of Planet Earth at the University of Arizona, said the finding “agrees with what is already happening in the Southwest, and will be further complicated by the already declining spring snowpack due to warming.”
“These are scary results, but scary in part because they are results of well thought-out scientific work by a large number of strong scientists,” said Overpeck, who was not part of the research team.
Anyone interested in hacking on Blogger's API should check out the freshly-updated Blogger Data API Developer Guide. It has sections covering development in several of the available client libraries, including Java, .NET and Python. For questions and discussion related to API development, head over to the bloggerDev list.
Last fall, Jordan introduced us all to our first Blog*Stars: those members of our Blogger Help Group who deserve special recognition for their contributions and their dedication to helping their fellow bloggers. Our original four are all still going strong, and now we're also pleased to announce the newest members to join their ranks. Congratulations to Panther, Sr. Mina, Miskaop, and Bonnie Calhoun! Keep shining, Blog*Stars!
The weeks seem to fly by at the moment. I've just completed yet another week in sunny Gredos; the weather has been excellent, this time under the wing of Greg as MC and me as his support. However that is until next week (which is only 2 days away), when I will be flying solo in San Zoilo.
This week proved very useful in order to try out ideas and see how the group reacts to different situations and figureheads, I personally thought the group worked very well together. The mix was quite vast from youngsters through to the more mature ;)
Having said that all the groups gave plenty of themselves and each took a turn to shine whether in a 1to1 situation or at the party, in which alcohol always helps (I really MUST learn to dance; although its a great excuse to hold a chica whilst she moves, lol).
The games were very enjoyable and it was great to see so many of you enjoying them and yourselves. One reason I love this program is the fact it helps you loose some of your inhibitions and brings out the real YOU!
I got to perform the neurotic Allan Felix (Woody Allen) in a play and although I kept losing my accent I think I did a good job, Greg seemed happy enough. I also got to act out some sketches I had put together as well as working with the improvisation group - who did me more than proud, well done to you all for having the cojones (balls) to play your roles ;)
I also got to show off my magic skills, which I really enjoyed too.
Yet again another great group, I don't know how it happens each time but it does. I hope to see some if not most of you all again, but don't expect the same program as I aim to keep you on your toes. I only hope I can be as good as you all think I will be; thank you ALL for your encouragement and your participation.
As usual I have posted a collection of photos to remind you of our experience HERE
You'll be hearing all about Alli everywhere soon. This diet pill is going to be advertised heavily this year. Over 150 million dollars will be spent in just one year to promote this drug. That would buy quite a few celebrity endorsements. It's the first diet pill drug to be approved for sale over the counter, without needing a prescription.
See the New York Times article about the Alli advertising promotion by GlaxoSmithKline.
Alli works by preventing the body from absorbing some of the fat one eats. This could have some very uncomfortable side effects if one eats too many fats.
Consumer Reports has just released the results of their research on diets and diet books. They have awarded Volumetrics the prize for being the best diet plan.
The Volumetrics Eating Plan
The main point behind the Volumetrics Eating Plan is to focus your eating on foods that have fewer calories per bite, or low 'energy density' foods. The idea is to eat lots and lots of fruits and vegetables.
It's been shown that people who eat a low energy diet end up consuming several hundred fewer calories per day than those with a high density diet. Yet they eat a much greater amount of food in total. It's all about feeling full on fewer calories.
In the picture here, the first small dish of macaroni and cheese has more calories than the second much larger portion. The second dish replaces regular pasta with whole-wheat pasta, uses less cheese and butter and piles on the vegetables.
Yesterday our building work was nearly finished. The bathroom looked lovely, and would look even lovelier when we have painted it. I still need to lay a new kitchen floor and fit a blind (pencil “I have glued myself into a corner!!!” into your blog-reading diaries for about three weeks’ time), and the builders need to come back and fit a waste pipe on the kitchen half-sink, and also replace a bathroom fascia panel that they had cut incorrectly (full marks to Armitage Shanks for simply sending me a new piece for free, when I was preparing myself for being told to buy a whole new unit).
One of the nice new features only just fitted is a soothing nightlight on the bathroom cabinet. Pregnancy has meant that my girlfriend has to get up more in the night now, so it’s good to know that we have made this chore a little bit more pleasant and that she would be able to get back to sleep more quickly.
“Enjoy your visit to the loo”, I said as I kissed her goodnight. (NB I normally say something a bit more romantic, like “Did you remember to turn the hot water off?” or “Can you remind me to tape that programme about steam engines tomorrow?”) The building work has been a bit stressful at times (I often imagine Kevin McCloud saying “Salvadore has bought materials from Homebase and B&Q, he’s using builders one of whom doesn’t speak English, and he’s trying to hold down a full-time job whilst he also occasionally makes them coffee), but it was almost all over. I relaxed and closed my eyes.
It was with some surprise that I was awoken by my girlfriend at 4am to be told that there was water coming through the bathroom ceiling. My sleep-addled brain realised that even Polish plumbers can’t make water defy gravity, so the problem appeared to be coming from upstairs. Which left just one problem: what is the etiquette of waking your neighbours in the middle of the night?
I was in my usual conundrum of having something quite bad be happening to me that is entirely someone else’s fault, but also not really wanting to make too much of a fuss about it all. Perhaps if I took the fuse out of the lighting circuit so we didn’t actually die when we touched things, I could leave it till morning? Or maybe put a note through their door and knock quite softly. Then I could say “I did try to wake you.”
I was once in a fast food outlet in London, at the height of the IRA’s mainland campaign. Bombs had been going off in litter bins – the first sign of which was often smoke coming from the bin. I looked out of the window – smoke was coming from the bin outside. I knew that I had to do something – I couldn’t let innocent people die because of not wanting to make a fuss. So I went up to the counter and queued up to tell somebody. Which is nearly as English as when that person then just said “Oh, is it still doing that?” and threw some water over it. Hah! No wonder they’ve had to end up sharing power with the DUP.
OK, if upstairs’ flat was on fire I would definitely tell them (polite knock, “Sorry to trouble you...”). And if the water’s coming through a concrete floor it must be getting quite bad up there. I’d want to know. They’d surely want to know before their bed floated away.
I was apologetic. He was apologetic. At the end I went even more English and decided to then formally introduce myself to him, which was a bit weird as he was possibly only wearing a T-shirt, pulled down quite low. Having to remove one hand to shake mine didn't help the situation.
After thinking that the building work was nearly all over, we might have to remove loads of tiles and re-lay the sodden floor that was only laid last week. But, whilst we wait for the ceiling electrics to dry out, at least we have a nice soothing nightlight to work by.
Ricki Lake has lost over 125 pounds. She was on "The View" last week and was offered the cover of US Weekly Magazine within 48 hours of being on the show.
She's lost the weight without any help from any kind of weight loss surgery. She was partially motivated to lose the weight in order to make her documentary about home birth in the tub. She's outspoken about the negative aspects of hospital births and the pressure for women to have cesareans. Cesarean births make up about 40% of births in many hospitals.
She'll be making a cameo appearance in John Travolta's "Hairspray" remake this summer.
Story Source: Ricki Lake Wows the Glossies
I am quite indecisive. Or am I? Haha. No, I am. Definitely. I think. My girlfriend shares this quality, which tends to make for a happy relationship. I would imagine that one decisive person and one indecisive person together would be a nightmare for both. Two decisive people together would be OK, so long as they also agreed on their decisions. But two indecisive people together seems to work. Though for all I know, my girlfriend still might not have made up her mind about me, and 5½ years on with a baby on the way she is perhaps totting up columns of pros and cons somewhere (“Pros: am having baby with him. Cons: can be quite indecisive.”)
So, painting the new bathroom has turned into quite a complicated decision-making process. We have already totally blown our budget just on tester pots. It’s not helped by the fact that the colours in the brochures and the colours when they are actually put on the wall bear as little relation to each other as Prince Harry and Prince Charles. We literally have the entire range of Homebase, Crown and Dulux colours in the neutral/brown palette, from Jasmine White through to Choc Chip on the walls. In fact, the 20+ different samples now cover more wall area than the old paint does. It looks like a patchwork quilt, apart from the Choc Chip bit, which has gone on a bit smearily, and looks like some kind of dirty protest.
We are getting nowhere with just picking which is our favourite, so decide to have an elimination process. We pair samples up randomly, then decide which of the two we like better. The loser is voted off, and after qualifying heats, first round, quarter finals, semi-finals and a grand final, we have a winner. Predictably, it is an inoffensive, neutral hue, almost exactly halfway between Jasmine White and Choc Chip.
“So, which one is that?” My girlfriend asks.
“I have absolutely no idea. I should probably have labelled them all somehow.”
I open all the pots up again and start to paint some more patches, trying to find the chosen colour.
Gluten-free diets are becoming increasingly popular.
Gluten is a protein found in wheat, barley and rye. A lot of people consider it a culprit in all sorts of ailments ranging from upset stomachs, arthritis, depresion, acne, infertility and gas. Avoiding all foods with flour products is becoming an increasingly popular dieting trend.
See a good article about this in the New York Times today.
Drought Drops Italy's Po River To Historic Low, Threatens Crops Across Europe
May 4, 2007 12:08 p.m. EST
Linda Young - AHN Staff Writer
Rome, Italy (AHN) - A severe drought in several European countries is threatening crops and has caused Italy to declare a state of emergency in its northern and central regions a day after France imposed water rationing. Farmers in Italy, France, Germany, Austria and Switzerland say it is the worst drought they have seen.
Italy acted on Thursday even as it was beginning to rain in the worst affected areas, saying that the forecasted rain would not make up for the rain deficit in the region.
The lack of rain in many parts of Europe has lowered river levels to historic lows. That includes Italy's Po River, which runs west to east across northern Italy. It feeds the fertile Po Valley where about a third of Italy's food is grown.
The German Weather Service said that April broke records kept since 1901 as the hottest and driest month. Italian officials say this winter was the warmest on record in 200 years.
Italy's warm winter caused the level of the Po River to start the Spring season low because there was very little snow in the Alps to melt and runoff into the river. That combined with a warm dry spring brought the river levels down further.
The Po Valley is also heavily industrialized and about 15 percent of Italy's electricity is from hydropower plants. Officials said the drought might force industries to shut down.
In Italy, sugar and rice crops are threatened. The drought has also dried up feed for dairy cows that produce milk for such classic Italian cheeses as Grana Padano and parmesan and feed for hogs that are used for Parma and San Daniele prosciutto.
In Germany, wheat, rye, barley, rapeseed, strawberries and lettuce crops are threatened by the drought. Dry meadows mean farmers have to buy fodder for cattle, which drives the price of milk up.
In Switzerland, the drought threatens the dairy industry, a large exporter of cheese and premium butter to the United States, that is suffering a lack of hay and meadows for cows.
~~~~~~~
About the Po River
My last sight of Dade was in semi darkness and muffled by sleeply eyes - it was 4.30am! after only 2 hours sleep - and off I headed to find out how easy it was to flag down a taxi in the middle of the night in Madrid...
Well easier than I though actually, and definetly easier than last time (back in December) aye Dade? :-) . I was in a taxi ny 4.34 and at the airport by 4.45... DAMN! Check-in didn't open till 5.30! So much for the 30min drive to the airport! Thanks Rob!! So instead of having another 45mins sleep next to Dade, I ended up sleeping on the airport floor next to strangers (as I wasn't the only one but boy was I pleased I didn't take up the suggestion to catch the last Metro out to the airport (at 1.30) and sleep there the night...) Anyway, checked in opened, I checked in and then tried to catch another couple of hours kip in the departure lounge, then on the flight... Got back to England with relative ease, no missing luggage this time, and even out into the terminal before my lift arrived. Managed to make it home in time to dump my bags, freshen up and then head to work at the restaurant at for midday....
It was going to be a long day - longer than I thought I discovered when I saw the rota at work and found out I was actually working till 10pm, not just 7pm as I had thought! Well no time like the present to dive straight back into the rat race is there? (And those that know me know I like to be busy, especially when I am trying not to think about what a wonderful week I had last week, and the fact that I don't know when I'll next get to spend even just a day with Dade...) (But Babes, you ARE worth it and you know if I could be there I would...)
The Kate Moss for Topshop clothing collection was just launched last week in the U.K. and Paris and quickly sold out. It looks like a lot of people who bought the items were thinking of profiting by reselling them on eBay. There are now over 3,500 items on auction at eBay.
The Kate Moss collection is available in British sizes 6 to 16. This converts to US sizes 2 to 12. Notice thee is no size zero available, which is a good sign for not encouraging sickly skinniness. On the other hand, anyone who is American size 14 or higher is out of luck if they want to wear the Kate Moss label.
See the very few size 16's, (American size 12's) being auctioned at eBay today.
See a video of the launch of the Kate Moss Topshop clothing collection here. It's a very skinny Kate Moss in a long red dress briefly flipping her hair in the Topshop storefront window.
Okay so I've been gone for some time, did you miss me??
So what have you been up to I hear you cry... ...well I stood in a queue for 12 hours, that's right count them 12 HOURS. In order to get a National Insurance number boy Spain works slowly. So I finally managed to get to the front of the queue, only to be told I need to pay money to the bank to get my card, OK no problem (i thought) only it was, it was a holiday for the next three days in Spain and the banks were closed, the two days it will be open I was going to be in Portugal (though i didn't know that at the time!) and then the next two weeks I have 2 camps back to back so yet another month without payment looms!?! Fingers crossed all will be well though...
However I did have Carrie fly all the way from London to join me in the queue - yeah I know how to treat a girl! Caz says... I could say something soppy here, like 'Standing in a queue with you is nothing and better than being apart" but in fairness, it was just wet, cold and annoyed me that at the end of it I still wouldn't even be allowed a work visa! Though YES, it was great to see you, just not the way I had expected to spend our first 5 hours together after being apart for 3 weeks!
We stayed at a cheap hotel that night, and all was well. UNTIL a bloody riot broke out in Madrid at 3am. No idea what caused it but Spaniards were smashing up streets and all sorts, and the police were dressed in riot gear chasing them. It appeared on the news the following day but I still don't know the cause.
Next day Carrie surprised me with a trip to Portugal for my birthday; We arrived at the airport early - in fact we were the first to check in, then sat around chatting close to our gate (at least we thought) then we starting to make our way to the gate thinking it must be ready to board only to our surprise hear them announce LAST CALL for our flight; they were closing the gate!!! I did a dad run (Peter Kaye will explain), to the gate to see WE were the last two to board - the plane had 10 other people on it! Caz says... How many times have you been at a boarding gate on time, and not been allowed to board for at LEAST 10-15 later? Well this would have been the ONE time!
So that dilemma over we relaxed and later (well actually at the same time, as they are an hour ahead) we arrived in Portugal. We arrived into Faro, and we were staying in Albufeira, which is only 40kms west, jumped on an 'express' bus thinking we'd be there in no time... Well the fact that driver managed to get us stuck in a car park for 20mins, only 2 mins after leaving the bus depot could have been an indication of how things were heading... We have no idea why, or how we ended up in the car park - had the bus driver never driven this route before? It took a passing lorry (YES! in the car park!) to lead him out before we were really on our way... An hour later we got to Albufeira and headed for our hotel which was apparently only a few hundred metres away from the bus station... ...RIGHT!!
After 2.5 hours and numerous rouch sketch maps drawn by locals, we found the hotel only to be told they had closed (reason unknown) and we had been upgraded to a different one - she drew another bad map explaining its 5 mins away and easy to find and so we headed off again, 1 hour later and after stopping in a bar for a beer out of desperation we found the next place - thanks to the english bar lady who can give directions and can draw a decent map! Caz says... See, the english in the resort were good for something! :-) So much for easy!
So now tired and exhausted from the travels and having seen most of Albufeira, whilst lugging our luggage around, we crashed onto the beds. Chewy says.... It was at this point Dade was pleased that I insisted we only bring hand luggage!... It turns out our original hotel was only 50m from the bus station! - the OLD one! Hostelworld you need to update the details!
So Albuferia (in the Algarve) was to be home for the next few days, but from what we had already seen, we'd seen most of it! It was nice enough but I'm sorry to say not somewhere neither of us would be keen to go again. Caz says... among other things it was a little too quiet, and not enough to do if you weren't content on just lazing on the beach - which we can both do, for a bit, but then we need more - like snorkeling, or climbing, or the like! (Admittedly as we did not have a car we could not explore further afield, nor was it peak season, but from what was made obvious lying on the beach was the thing to do here...)
It was full of Brits who had issues with food and fashion. You know the kind of people who back home would never dream of wearing those ghastly colours or socks & sandals together, but here it was okay. The kind of people who eat huge ice cre
ams and claim they have a thyroid issue and THAT'S why their overweight. Speaking of puddings; as it was my birthday I asked for a Apple Pie, Carrie asked for a crepe - who got the better deal!?
Caz says... the crepe was sooooo good! Strawberries and chocolate sauce, and lashings of whipped cream! Apart from that crepe though, I was rather disappointed in the food, far from cheap offerings of fabulous seafood and more like medicore british half board food! And fries with EVERYTHING! I even had fries served to me at breakfast when i ordered an omelet!
Carrie got a great sun burn, pics coming (I hope) Caz says... not on your life! - Yes mum, it was my typical first 'burn' of the year, and yes I did take sunscreen with me! It was the wind that deceived us to how hot the sun actually was...
She took me out for my Birthday to a nice Indian restaurant, where I tucked in 'Indian style'; eating with my fingers etc. Only to hear some older guy criticising every table around him and not even discreetly - almost like he thought we didn't understand English. I heard him ask his wife "are they English?" She replied "Yes" at which point he says "and he's eating with his hands, eerrrk". He also kept criticising another table - a guy with tattoos, to be honest I was SO close to speaking out, but didn't for fear it may ruin the night, so we him to his ignorance and enjoyed our own company.
Caz says... despite our negative comments on the place, we did have a great time, and it was very relaxing not to have to be anywhere or do anything at any particular time - plus we got to spend all that time together chilling...
So after 4 days relaxing in Portugal and sunning ourselves we headed back to Madrid - not without first having one last almost disaster - we booked a minibus to take us to the airport, he was 30 minutes late which only made things look like a repeat performance. Caz says... we had thought paying the extra 4€ and saving us taking 3 buses and 2.5 hours was worth it! But in the end our Portuguese driver drove in true Portuguese style and didn't let us down and we arrived back with no complications, the flights to and from where very good (www.ryanair.com) and cheap ;) Caz says... you thought 1 penny seats were cheap, try 1 euro cent seats!
So we headed to Rob's to reclaim the rest of our cases and he kindly agreed to let us stay there as Carrie was flying back at a stupid hour the next morning and I had a program the next day.
Carrie and I headed out to the Tapas meet and greet (it's where all the volunteers for Vaughantown meet) you also get free food and drink ;) After meeting the Anglo's Carrie said we had to stop off somewhere she knew?? She knows no where? Thought I. Suddenly a plot was hatching!
Anyway I deduced it was Andy, then realised he was in the south of Spain? Chris? yes, she had met Chris once and we got on well, that must be it. O Boy was I in for a shock! Caz says... I was just impressed I'd managed to keep it all a secret so long! Do you still hate Surprises Dade?
We turned up at the station, met by Chris, then Emma, walked into the bar and there was around 20+ people there i had meet through my time in Spain, teachers I worked with, Rob and his girlfriend, Spaniards from camps, trust me this was a military operation to get three groups of people who didn't know each other together at one place to celebrate my Birthday, I couldn't have managed it!!! Caz says... I had wanted to get you all the way into the bar before you saw anyone, but Chris's directions of, its right near Alsonzo Martinez left out the bit about all the sides streets between the two!
I realised just how special Carrie is and what she was prepared to do, and I also felt shit because I had told her I didn't want to commit to anything because I didn't feel ready for a serious relationship with anyone and I knew that her being in London and I in Spain was very difficult for us both. I guess I need to look into just what I do want and what I'm prepared to offer, what I can say is it was the nicest surprise ever and totally unexpected and for that I thank her greatly and to all those who attended I thank you for making the effort and taking the time.
You sometimes don't realise the lives you touch and the difference you make but it's nice to know that sometimes you do get to see just how much people care. Caz says... And you are worth caring about, HAPPY BIRTHDAY DADE!
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