Category Archives: arm wresting

February 18, 2014 · 6:27 am

Einstein in the 21st Century

There is a young man living in the Southwest who is too smart for college simply because they cannot teach him anything!

This 19-year-old is in process of changing how we use nuclear fusion. He has a vision of a pure fusion energy but is in process of building small reactors that will not fail and contaminate like the 50’s style currently in use.

Taylor Wilson built his first nuclear reactor at the age of 14 but if his mind finds a way for pure fusion, it may be our path way to the stars and beyond.

He is a prodigy. He’s working with a professor at a school for the exceptionally gifted who said, after working with the student for a while, that he “…has never encountered a smarter person than this kid. yet he is so down to earth.”

In this student, live mathematics and science and the vision to see and understand both.  He may just be our gateway to the unknown.  He may just open up a future where coal, oil, fracking and all the other ecologically destructive practices for grabbing and using energy are no longer needed.

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/21134540/vp/52207962#52207962

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February 3, 2014 · 8:32 am

A Tale of 3 Companies – 2 Understand Customer Service

We are in the midst of renovating our kitchen.

My husband and I are celebrating our 30th anniversary by renovating instead of going to Italy or going on the Power Tour.  So this renovation is a big deal to us.  We are doing a lot of the work but we are also relying on three companies for product and installation.

Two of these companies get customer service, completely.  The 3rd company was and is a huge disappointment to us.  This is the story of these 3 companies.

We shopped around for the granite counter tops and found Troy Granite had the deepest inventory and the best price of any of the 4 companies we considered.  We ordered our granite counter tops from Troy and they threw in a new under mount, double bowl sink, free.

We also found our environmentally friendly floor at Troy Granite which is truly a one-stop shop for renovations of all kinds.  But we picked up the new faucet — VIGO VG02006ST PullDown Kitchen Spray Faucet, Steel  at Amazon.

Countertops and floor taken care of, we moved to the piece de resistance for me (I cook and can and bake, a lot)  — a new Jenn-Air, down draft, stainless steel stove.

We bought our new stove at an appliance store called Hawkins and Sons – the second company of the 3 involved in our kitchen reno saga. Granted our stove wasn’t a Wolf or a Viking but it equaled 25% of the cost of our kitchen renovation — a sizable chunk of our budget and a considerable investment from our perspective.

Hawkins was paid to do the conversion for the stove – gas to propane – then we would pick it up, take it home and put it in place for the third company — Kauffman Gas – to connect the stove to the gas line which was already in place.

Everything was going well until the morning of January 22nd.

The team from Kauffman Gas arrived on time, worked quickly and efficiently and had the propane gas line to the stove hooked up in less than 30 minutes.  So far so good but not for long.

Steve called me to the kitchen.  First, he told me that the appliance company had not completed the conversion that we had paid extra for it to do.  Steve told me he took care of that but…when he fired up the stove, he ran into a huge problem.  One of the gas lines inside the stove was fractured.

Turning on the grill on the left side of the stove, he demonstrated. Flames shot 6 inches out from under the surface and rose a foot above the grill.

Steve, who works with gas-fired appliances all day long, took the knobs off the front of the stove and told his assistant to turn off the gas valve in the basement and the one on the outside tank.

I called my husband; he called Hawkins, immediately.  The reaction he got was less than stellar.

No concern was expressed.  No responsibility was acknowledged.  Not only did they not offer to replace the stove, they weren’t really interested in sending a repair person to the house.  In fact, they made it my husband’s problem by forcing him to meet their schedule — forcing him to take a day off work to let their repair person in to see what was wrong with the new stove they sold us.

Clearly, the words “customer” and “service” are not in the Hawkins lexicon but we had no choice.  We owned a very expensive and unusable stove.

Hawkins’ repair man confirmed what Kauffman’s technician had told us – a factory defect.  Two more weeks without a stove or oven. Still no offer to replace the stove – parts would be ordered and the repair would be done here even though the stainless steel on the top of the stove was warped, even though I had no confidence in the safety of this gas-fueled stove top.

With my confidence in the product gone and no help from the store where we bought it, my husband wrote an email to the CEO of Whirlpool – the third company in this story and the company that came to the rescue quickly, efficiently and effectively.  

Within 4 hours of sending the email, we received a reply.  Whirlpool would be happy to replace the stove.   The new stove would be shipped from the factory in the mid-West.  Whirlpool’s technicians would do the conversion and installation on site and on our schedule.  And they would remove the damaged stove.  No questions, no arguments just a swift and wonderful response to our dilemma.

How sad that Hawkins refused to take responsibility for a problem with an appliance they sold to us.  How wonderful that Kauffman Gas went the extra mile to help us and to ensure we were safe.

And how remarkable that a major corporation – Whirlpool – listened to our problem and resolved it in less time than it took for Hawkins to try to argue its way out or responsibility for its failure.

Thank you Whirlpool. Thank you Kauffman Gas.  Shame on you Hawkins & Sons Appliances.

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January 11, 2014 · 5:28 am

The Creative Adult is the Child Who Has Survived | LinkedIn

I have long thought that each and every adult has the opportunity, every day, to help grow a child’s imagination and dreams or at least keep the spark of the dream alive.

Unfortunately many adults don’t even know they have this power.  They blunder through their lives wounding young souls, stepping on dreams, breaking small hearts.

The very first time I thought this, I was walking to work.  I was on 11th Street  when I heard shouting.  A big, burly woman was leaning over a tiny child, screaming at him that he was stupid, that he was worthless.

I walked over to her, got between her and the little boy and told her to find someone else to hurt.  If she wanted someone her own size, she could try me.

Time stopped for a moment.  Her eyes glittered in her angry face which was inches from mine; her fists balled up and rose slowly.  The little boy’s face was upturned, fear struggling with wonder at what was happening right in front of him.  I waited.

Suddenly all the bluster went out of her.  Tears welled in her eyes. Her hands dropped to her sides.  She talked about her lost job, her failed marriage, her fear, her sorrow, her anger.

I put my arms around her and  held her while she cried.  Slowly, we both realized that the boy, her son, had wrapped an arm around her leg and an arm around mine and was holding on, tight.

The mother and I smiled at each other. We smiled at him.  She knelt down, held him and said, “I’m sorry.”  His face turned toward me, his eyes wide and his smile wider.  When she stood, she leaned toward me, smiling, and whispered, “You have God in you.  Thank you.”

I hugged her back, told her that if she ever needed help, I came by this way 5 days a week and would be there, for her.  We turned in opposite directions and walked back into our separate lives.  But there, on the corner of 11th and Filbert, outside the Greyhound Bus Station, the two of us had worked a tiny miracle – we gave love and laughter back to her young son.

I never saw them again, this mother and child, but I know that things between them were different after that day.

I always thought that moments like this one hold the power that each of us carries, within.  I know that one word, one touch, one smile can make a change.  Now, someone has written about the power of one adult to hold one child and help them reach for their dream.

I hope you enjoy this post.  And I hope all the people in homes and schools, on street corners or buses, people everywhere understand that words, which we use so easily and hold so cheaply, can keep a child’s dream alive just as easily as they can kill it.

Think…before you speak, please. Speak when your words can help a child.

The Creative Adult is the Child Who Has Survived | LinkedIn.

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January 1, 2014 · 9:24 am

Preparing for Your Inner Journey | The Chopra Center

Sometimes things happen that we think are random.

But most of the time, it’s the universe, speaking clearly to us.

As you may know, I have been taking Deepak Chopra’s and Orpah’s 21 day meditation. Once I finished, I started receiving emails with gifts – 7 days of them. One was for a new meditation series – Awaken to Happiness, which I started today.

This series is free, too. Each lesson takes a week of learning…growing and starting to see – beginning with exploring happiness and identifying your true source of happiness.

Today, the first day, the universe sent me to an article by Caroline Myss – an article about taking a journey inward to learn more about my self, my ego, my reactions and my life.

Since it is the first day of a new year and since I consider this article to be a gift from the universe, I wanted to share it with anyone who wants to begin a new year with a new journey – one that can quiet the noise of always needing
“…just a bit more” whether it’s stuff, money or ego boosting.

I wish everyone the best in 2014 and hope that you might want to join me as I begin to journey into what really makes me happy – who really makes me happy, as I begin to discover the wonderful spirit that lives inside my skin — my soul.

Namaste

Preparing for Your Inner Journey | The Chopra Center.

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December 18, 2013 · 5:32 am

Geoffrey Canada Knows How To Save Education

And Geoffrey Canada knows how to save children and parents and communities.

I’ve written about Mr. Canada before – one of my Project 365 heroes.  But I think this man, his Harlem Project and the incredible success he has had with rescuing children, educating them and sending them off to college deserves to be revisited.

Perhaps it’s because I just finished Canada’s book – Fist Stick Knife Gun: A Personal History of Violence.

If you want to know how to save our children, how to make our schools better, how to change, grow and heal our communities, read Fist Stick Knife Gun: A Personal History of Violence. Then get out of your chair, get in your car or on your bike or even on your skates, go to the nearest school, step inside and volunteer to help change the children’s worlds.

Geoffrey Canada is the man behind the Harlem Project. His mind, his drive, his desire to help children, parents and the community made the Harlem project a reality. And Geoffrey Canada knows his audience; he lived in abject poverty, the son of a single mom in a neighborhood where value was assigned based on how well you fought.

Geoffrey Canada’s approach points the way to saving all the children who live in neighborhoods owned and operated by drug dealers, drug users, robbers, muggers, burglars and rapists — killers of every description. My take on his core thesis is you cannot change children who live in these communities just by working inside the 4 walls of a school; you MUST change the community, reach out to the parents, help them where they are so they can reach out and change their own worlds, one step at a time, one day at a time.

Working in one of these schools in one of these neighborhoods, I see  “throw away” children every day.  On a good day, these kids are raising themselves; on a bad day, they are being turned into mules, snitches and sometimes, enforcers.

I could stay home.  I could turn a blind eye.  I could be one of millions of people who sit at their table every morning and bemoan the ignorance, the violence the destruction being wrought in our communities and schools.

I won’t.  I get up and go to work in one of these schools every day.  I reach out to touch these wonderful middle school and high school children, talk to them. offer them   If I can make a difference in the life of just one child, I have done a good job.

So to everyone who thinks this is someone else’s problem, here’s my advice. This holiday season, give a gift that cannot be bought in any store.  Get up. Go to a troubled school.  See how you can help!

These children did nothing wrong but to have the misfortune of being born poor.  They don’t deserve to die – physically, emotionally or mentally.

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December 8, 2013 · 8:46 am

On the Path To Self Knowledge with Oprah & Deepak Chopra

In Oprah’s 21 day Desire & Destiny meditation series Oprah and Deepak ask us to answer three, simple questions:

Who am I?

What do I want?

How can I serve?

Small, aren’t they?  But I think they are the toughest questions you can ask and answer.

Each question is part of one week’s exploration.  Each builds on the other and helps you to slowly but surely understand who you really are without all the noise that people, life and even you, yourself, have heaped on the small, brave spark that waits for each of us to listen, again.

As I wrote in my previous blog post, one of the biggest things I have learned about myself is that what I really want (Day 8) is to live from my heart in peace and joy.  Today, I learned something I knew, we all know really,  but tend to forget.

In this whole world, teeming with billions of people, there is only one you.

Read that again.  There is only one you, one me, one unique person.  And if we dare to follow our path up the mountain, if we follow our bliss, each of us has within us the power  to change the world.

Don’t believe it?  Nelson Mandela changed the world — from a prison cell where he lived for 27 years, this one beautiful soul reached out and broke the back of apartheid.

How about Geoffrey Canada?  His Harlem Children’s Zone rescued thousands of children and families, rebuilt a neighborhood and reformed education forever in Harlem, New York.

What about Shirley Chisholm?  She  became the first African-American woman elected to Congress.  She fought not just for her constituency but for all people in need of a better life and she won.

Take just a moment, today, to ask yourself those three questions then listen, really listen.  The universe will send you the answer and it might surprise you.

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November 30, 2013 · 6:14 am

Meditating with Oprah & Deepak Chopra

Like hundreds of thousands of other people, I signed up the Oprah’s 21 day Desire & Destiny meditation series.  She introduces each day; Deepak Chopra leads the meditations.

Like hundreds of thousands of people, I am having joyous moments of peace, eye-opening moments of realizing I am the only person holding me back and amazing moments of insight into who I really am and what really makes me smile.

One of the biggest things I have learned about myself is that what I really want (Day 8) is to live from my heart in peace and joy.

Yesterday, I learned that something that happened to me almost 20 years ago was real!

It was Day 12 – Inspired me – the me who steers from her heart.

While meditating a thought shot straight into my brain about an experience I had in 1996, also while meditating. I was deep in meditation when a voice, clear as a bell said, “Rescue me.”

It was so clear that I came up out of a very deep meditation, slipped out the side door of the house and walked the 2 acres we own, trying to find the bird, rabbit, kitten or dog that had called to me to rescue it.

There was no spirit out there in need of help but I took it to mean that I was to write about animal communicators.

I did tons of research but I was just not convinced that this phenomenon was real – that people could hear and talk to animals. And I put the idea away. Until yesterday.

I believe that I am to write a book entitled Rescue Me with an author who I met through her book, “Blessing the Bridge: What Animals Teach Us About Death, Dying and Beyond” a book that helps us ease the transition of our pets from here to the next plain.

I say I “met” the author, Rita Reynolds, but I didn’t really meet her for 6 years. During the first 6 years, we corresponded via email. Our friendship grew out of words flying through the ethernet.

Two years ago I met her and we were so very surprised at how alike we were, physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. She ran an animal rescue – saving old dogs, throwaways that people were tired of and didn’t want to support as they aged and died.

And yesterday, more than 15 years after I was called to “rescue”, I believe I discovered why Rita and I met, maybe just one of the many reasons we met. I believe we are to write a book about rescuing living spirits and helping them to finish their lives in comfort, in peace and surrounded by love.

Yesterday, because of Deepak and Oprah’s Desire & Destiny meditations, I didn’t hesitate. I sent her an email about the idea, right away!

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October 26, 2013 · 10:19 am

Russell Brand May Have Started a Revolution Last Night

Who knew that Russell Brand could be so eloquent, so passionate and so on top of the current political, economic and social situation in the UK and the US?

Here is somebody who explicitly calls out the current crop of do nothing politicians in both countries and says to the rest of us, rise up and revolt!

Please listen to him, all the way through.  He is articulate; his positions are based on facts and he is able to walk right around this interviewer who is trying to pillory him because he doesn’t vote.

Brand may not have all the answers but he sure as hell knows what questions to ask, what general direction our nations should be going and what’s stopping us.

Three cheers for Russel Brand!  And thanks to Gawker for making this video available.

Russell Brand May Have Started a Revolution Last Night.

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September 2, 2013 · 8:49 am

About Hospitals…and Doctors…and Illness

We were back in the hospital last week.

I say “we” because when my husband goes in, I go in.

And once again, we experienced the “hospital” mentality that says they know best and we know nothing.

Once again, we were proven right but, once again, at the expense of my husband’s health and the cost of 3 days of our lives!

Here’s the deal.

My husband has been hospitalized 40 times since 2001.  The first 15 of those hospitalizations were for surgeries due to bladder cancer.  The rest of them have been the result of repeated infections resulting from his urostomy.  When he gets sick, his fever runs straight up the thermometer and we run straight for Chester County Hospital.

My husband goes septic not in days but in hours and sometimes in minutes.  But we both know the drill and so does our General Practitioner.  Visit the doctor; give a urine sample.  Get a prescription for an antibiotic.  Take one with two Tylenol and take the temp every 30 minutes.  When the temperature hits 101 degrees, head for the hospital.

At the hospital, the same one he has been admitted to over 20 times, the one with the au courant Electronic Medical Records (EMR), the one where they should know EXACTLY what to do, he is admitted, quickly, put on IV fluids and almost immediately, put on IV Zosyn – the antibiotic that is specifically designed to hit the bacteria that make him sick.

At least that’s the way it’s supposed to go.

Every once and awhile we get a doctor (or two or three) who maybe can’t read EMRs or have their hearing aids down and can’t hear me or my husband when we tell them what he needs.  We got “those doctors” this time.  And from Tuesday evening to Thursday evening, my husband was subjected to the wrong antibiotics — antibiotics that made him even more sick, antibiotics he had an allergic reaction to and antibiotics that made him vomit.

During this time, the two of us must have asked, pushed for and demanded Zosyn a dozen times.  Every time we were patronized, told they had to wait for the cultures and ignored.  On Wednesday, I bet the doctor $50 that the cultures would show enterococcus, klebsiella and/or ecoli.  He smiled, shook his head and said we had to wait and see.

Miracle!  Thursday!!

The cultures showed enterococcus and klebsiella.  Then and ONLY then did they hang Zosyn (actually Unisyn but the same drug).  Less than 24 hours later, my husband was back, feeling good, able to sit up, read, eat.  Which leads me to some questions for the medical team at Chester County Hospital.

WTF?

Why do you know this man better than he does or I do?  Why can’t you LISTEN?  Why didn’t you do “Ctrl F, find and read instance after instance of hospitalization to learn that — duh — he cultures the same 3 bacteria every single time?  Why didn’t you believe he needed Zosyn?  Could this be why health care costs are so high in this country?

Are our doctors really deaf and dumb?  

Patients and their families can be troublesome.  They can be demanding and upset and blah, blah, blah.  I get it.  But NOBODY knows the patient or the patient’s history like the patient and the patient’s family.  Our input shouldn’t be ignored; it shouldn’t just “be considered.”  Our input should be factored in to all the other information now readily available via EMR to the medical staff and someone, anyone or how about just one of them, should listen to us.

A letter will be going to the new President of Chester County Hospital.  I love the changes he has brought, the energy and the warmth the staff now exhibit.  But they still have a few things to address….like involving the patient and his family in decisions regarding treatment.  This is a big problem that’s still open even though it is written as a policy in their patient handbook.

Maybe they should all read that before they start their shifts!

 

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June 29, 2012 · 7:58 am

Bernie Sanders Storms the Senate Floor and Challenges Congress’ Koch Whores

Please listen to Senator Bernie Sanders.  He is talking about the gap between the very rich – 400 people – and very poor people – 150 million of them.  The gap between rich and poor is widening, rapidly. And the middle class is disappearing.  We are becoming an oligarchy.

Bernie Sanders Storms the Senate Floor and Challenges Congress’ Koch Whores.

If we don’t speak up, fight back, we will continue to lose ground faster every day.  Please share with your friends.

Let our voices join Senator Sanders and tell our elected officials we want it to change.  They work for us.  They should listen to us.

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