Checks and balances. Have you ever thought about how amazing those
two words are? In the simplest sense, writing checks and figuring out
how much money you have left after you’ve written them. In the larger
sense, if something is depleted or out of whack, something comes along
to reestablish order.
Which brings me to AANWR....
On the northern edge of our continent, stretching from the
peaks of the Brooks Range across a vast expanse of tundra to the
Beaufort Sea, lies Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. An
American Serengeti, the Arctic Refuge continues to pulse with
million-year-old ecological rhythms. It is the greatest living reminder
that conserving nature in its wild state is a core American value.
(National Resources Defense Council)
After allowing my 13 year old daughter Hannah to sit on the couch
all summer and watch TV, while surfing the net for days on end, my
guilt that nothing worthwhile was filling that pretty little head of
hers was mounting. I started looking for things to do in this
wonderful town of ours. I definitely wanted to go to the Lautner
exhibit at the Armand Hammer Museum and Hannah saw a picture of one of
his houses and was actually interested too, but then I saw something on
Daily Candy talking about an event at the Santa Monica Library and
thought “Aha! This’ll be the thing I do. This’ll be the antidote to all
those episodes of The Suite Life of Zack and Cody. I was going to take
Hannah to a symposium on Food and Climate Change.”
My husband Dave always seems to be ahead of the cool gadget curve,
making sure we're the first kids on our block to have the latest and
greatest tech toys. We've had our Wii for years, stood in line the
first week for the iPhone (him not me), sold our regular laptop to
upgrade to the MacBook Air (worth every penny) and are still jamming
away a year later on Rock Band when most people have never even played
the game. I couldn't imagine what he was going to pull out of his
Christmas stocking this year. Thanks to the generosity of his boss, it
was a Kindle. For those of you who shop on Amazon – which would be almost everyone
with an Internet connection on the planet – the Kindle is not exactly
new, but it sure is hard to get your hands on, which is a bit of a
surprise considering how expensive it is.
FOOD HUGGERS
Who said laundry can’t be fun? LooHoo Wool Dryer Balls are colorful, reusable dryer balls that reduce drying time (by 25 percent) and soften laundry naturally! LooHoos lift and separate clothes creating a constant motion that allows more air to circulate around your wet laundry so it dries faster. Made of lanolin-rich wool, about the size of a baseball, these dryer balls can be used for years and the hues will never transfer onto your clothes. The wool fibers absorb static cling, and an added bonus, wool absorbs odors too… so no more stinky socks!
After spending years in the political closet (one of the dangers of a politically mixed marriage) I have emerged with a flourish, and a job as Press Person for a Michigan candidate for the United States House of Representatives. I have been working for Bob Alexander, a Democrat running in Michigan’s 8th Congressional District, against Mike Rogers, a four-term Republican incumbent. Bob is the kind of Democrat my parents are – a Joan Baez, “if you want peace, work for justice” kind of guy who spent years circulating petitions and working crowds “cold” to promote the value of a living wage for working people, and eventually persuaded the Michigan legislature to raise the minimum wage by 29 percent. He was not holding office at the time, mind you; it was just the right thing to do.