Lottie & Lisa
Erich Kästner
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Dripread - A Drop of Knowledge Each day
An interesting take on reading in an increasingly mechanized, digitized, scheduled age.
dripread (v) To break up the reading of information into bitesize installments.
Love reading but don't seem to get time to finish a book?. Dripread converts your book into a daily digest that you can read by email.
Dripread is free and simple to use:
Choose a book or upload your own.
Subscribe for free with just your email address.
Enjoy five minutes a day of reading pleasure.
Bask in the warm fuzzy feeling of completing your book.
Saturday, May 21, 2011
190 Show Up @ Hanford Hearing, Including Mayor Sam Adams
Thank you to the over 190 people who came to the hearing in Portland Thursday night to oppose the federal Energy Depatment's latest scheme to use Hanford as a national radioactive waste dump to import and bury 12,600 truckloads of extremely radioactive wastes, mostly from nuclear reactors that will be dismantled in coming decades. Mayor Sam Adams came in person, joining represenatives from Senator Wyden and Merkley, to give a statement on behalf of all the City Commissioners opposing use of Hanford as a national radioactive waste dump, saying that trucking "nuclear waste through Oregon on its way to Hanford poses an unacceptable risk to the health of Portland citizens." The Oregonian joined in with a very strong editorial that summarized the views of many of the people who stayed until nearly 10PM to testify: "This is a bad idea. It runs counter to everything that Oregon and Washington, Northwest tribes and health advocates have sought to achieve in taming a Hanford nuclear beast that menaces underground water, the Columbia River, and human and wildlife populations nearby. ... "Putting Hanford to dual, opposing purposes -- cleaning up while burying more than 12,000 truckloads of hot junk over 60 years -- is a perfect Catch-22. We'll never be done." Our testimony included both the fact that trucking the waste will cause cancer in people along the truck route and how USDOE's own projection - buried in the EIS - is that putting this waste in landfill trenches will lead to radiation doses high enough to cause fatal cancers in 2 to 4% of the children who will use the groundwater between the dump and Columbia River. We can stop this insanity, including the drive to make more nuclear waste from reactors which the industry wants the taxpayers to pick up the tab to dispose of - as cheaply as possible in landfill trenches or boreholes that will leak, that will contaminate water, and will cause significant numbers of cancers in the people using the water for thousands of years. More than twice as many people came to the Portland hearing as went to any other hearing across the US on this impact statement - thanks to the organizing efforts of our wonderful volunteers and staff. Please - use the link below to send in your own comments if you couldn't make the hearings. Our Citizens' Guide and the presentation we gave to an overflow crowd of over 80 people at our pre-hearing workshop are both available atwww.hoanw.org (just a short way down the home page in portion about the GTCC waste EIS). Please send a copy of your comments to your Senators, Congresspeople and local newspaper editors. Let us know what you send in by cc'ing office@hoanw.org. As always, we're here to help you with your comments - just email us atoffice@hoanw.org or call (206)382-1014. Thank you for your caring support, Gerry Pollet, JD Executive Director, Heart of America Northwest "The Public's Voice for Hanford Clean-Up" |
Be Heard - How to Send In Your Comments Click here for our Citizens' Guide - Page four has suggested comments
How to send in your comments by June 27, 2011: US Mail: Greater-Than-Class C Low-Level Radioactive Waste EIS
By electronic comment form:
http://www.gtcceis.anl.gov./
Please send a copy to your US Senators and Representatives and a copy to us at office@hoanw.org |
Thursday, May 19, 2011
When Books Could Change Your Life: Why What We Pore Over At 12 May Be The Most Important Reading We Ever Do
By Tim Kreider | Posted 9/24/2008
A GIRL I ONCE CAUGHT READING Fahrenheit 451 over my shoulder on the subway confessed: "You know, I'm an English lit major, but I've never loved any books like the ones I loved when I was 12 years old." I fell slightly in love with her when she said that. It was so frank and uncool, and undeniably true.
Let's all admit it: We never got over those first loves. Listen to the difference in the voices of any groups of well-read, overeducated people discussing contemporary fiction, or the greatest books they've ever read, and the voices of those same people, only two drinks later, talking about the books they loved as kids. The Betsy Tacy Books! I loved those books! The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet! I can't believe you know that! The Little House on the Prairie books! Oh, my God--did you read The Long Winter? So good. Hey--does anyone else remember The Spaceship Under the Apple Tree?
It's not just that these books, unlike adult literature, have been left unsullied by professors turning them into objects of tedious study. We love these books, dearly and uncritically, the way we love the smell of our first girlfriend's perfume, no matter how cheap or tacky it might have been. Let's be honest: We all know that Ulysses and A la recherché du temps perdu are "better" books than The Velveteen Rabbit or The Little Prince, but come on--which would you take with you on a spaceship to salvage from the dying Earth?
Let me put it another way: When was the last time a book changed your life? I don't mean offered you new insights or ideas or moved you--I mean profoundly changed the way you see the world or shaped the kind of person you are? If you're like me, it's been longer than you'd like to admit. I recently read Eli Sagan's Cannibalism: Human Aggression Cultural Form, which enabled me to see capitalism as a highly sublimated form of aggression, on the same continuum as headhunting, warfare, and slavery, and Marcus Aurelius' Meditations, which gave me a greater equanimity about the esteem of others and assuaged my fear of death. But if I ever end up holed up in my parents' farmhouse holding off the bulldozers with a machine gun while listening to Beethoven's late quartets, it'll be because of the story "And the Moon Be Still as Bright" from Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles...More...
A GIRL I ONCE CAUGHT READING Fahrenheit 451 over my shoulder on the subway confessed: "You know, I'm an English lit major, but I've never loved any books like the ones I loved when I was 12 years old." I fell slightly in love with her when she said that. It was so frank and uncool, and undeniably true.
Let's all admit it: We never got over those first loves. Listen to the difference in the voices of any groups of well-read, overeducated people discussing contemporary fiction, or the greatest books they've ever read, and the voices of those same people, only two drinks later, talking about the books they loved as kids. The Betsy Tacy Books! I loved those books! The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet! I can't believe you know that! The Little House on the Prairie books! Oh, my God--did you read The Long Winter? So good. Hey--does anyone else remember The Spaceship Under the Apple Tree?
It's not just that these books, unlike adult literature, have been left unsullied by professors turning them into objects of tedious study. We love these books, dearly and uncritically, the way we love the smell of our first girlfriend's perfume, no matter how cheap or tacky it might have been. Let's be honest: We all know that Ulysses and A la recherché du temps perdu are "better" books than The Velveteen Rabbit or The Little Prince, but come on--which would you take with you on a spaceship to salvage from the dying Earth?
Let me put it another way: When was the last time a book changed your life? I don't mean offered you new insights or ideas or moved you--I mean profoundly changed the way you see the world or shaped the kind of person you are? If you're like me, it's been longer than you'd like to admit. I recently read Eli Sagan's Cannibalism: Human Aggression Cultural Form, which enabled me to see capitalism as a highly sublimated form of aggression, on the same continuum as headhunting, warfare, and slavery, and Marcus Aurelius' Meditations, which gave me a greater equanimity about the esteem of others and assuaged my fear of death. But if I ever end up holed up in my parents' farmhouse holding off the bulldozers with a machine gun while listening to Beethoven's late quartets, it'll be because of the story "And the Moon Be Still as Bright" from Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles...More...
Our Next-Door Neighbors Are Meth-Lords!
DRUGS: Large meth lab found in Walla Walla motel
By Herald staff
One of the largest active methamphetamine labs in Walla Walla County history was discovered Wednesday evening when the Walla Walla SWAT team searched the Walla Walla Vineyard Inn.
Officers raided the motel 325 E. Main St. at 6 p.m. after the city drug unit developed information that a meth lab was inside one of the rooms, said a news release.
As the officers forced their way in through the front door, Clifford E. Chew, 56, allegedly tried to escape out the back door. He was caught a short distance from his room.
Lab certified officers took apart the equipment without incident and took it to a secure location.
Meth and many other items used to make and distribute the drug were seized from the room.
The SWAT Team was helped by sheriff’s deputies, city patrol officers and the city’s Special Teams Unit.
The number of meth labs in Washington state has dropped dramatically in recent years, with much of the drug coming into the country through Mexico.
Chew is a career criminal with more than 35 felony arrests and convictions for attempted murder, first-degree assault, burglary and numerous drug violations.
He is being held in the Walla Walla County Jail on investigation of manufacturing methamphetamine and several other felony drug-related charges.
Chew also has an absconding warrant out of Umatilla County, Ore., and is currently on Umatilla County’s Most Wanted list.
The motel manager, Dena R. Turner, 37, was also arrested Wednesday night after a large amount of ammonia was found in her freezer.
This is a common ingredient in making of meth. She was jailed on suspicion of complicity to manufacture methamphetamine, a class B felony.
Contamination levels at the motel are unknown at this time, said the release. It is also unknown how long Chew had been cooking meth at the motel.
One SWAT Team member suffered an injured knee during the raid.
Read more: http://www.tri-cityherald.com/2011/05/19/1496037/drugs-large-meth-lab-found-in.html#ixzz1MqYmFUy7
By Herald staff
One of the largest active methamphetamine labs in Walla Walla County history was discovered Wednesday evening when the Walla Walla SWAT team searched the Walla Walla Vineyard Inn.
Officers raided the motel 325 E. Main St. at 6 p.m. after the city drug unit developed information that a meth lab was inside one of the rooms, said a news release.
As the officers forced their way in through the front door, Clifford E. Chew, 56, allegedly tried to escape out the back door. He was caught a short distance from his room.
Lab certified officers took apart the equipment without incident and took it to a secure location.
Meth and many other items used to make and distribute the drug were seized from the room.
The SWAT Team was helped by sheriff’s deputies, city patrol officers and the city’s Special Teams Unit.
The number of meth labs in Washington state has dropped dramatically in recent years, with much of the drug coming into the country through Mexico.
Chew is a career criminal with more than 35 felony arrests and convictions for attempted murder, first-degree assault, burglary and numerous drug violations.
He is being held in the Walla Walla County Jail on investigation of manufacturing methamphetamine and several other felony drug-related charges.
Chew also has an absconding warrant out of Umatilla County, Ore., and is currently on Umatilla County’s Most Wanted list.
The motel manager, Dena R. Turner, 37, was also arrested Wednesday night after a large amount of ammonia was found in her freezer.
This is a common ingredient in making of meth. She was jailed on suspicion of complicity to manufacture methamphetamine, a class B felony.
Contamination levels at the motel are unknown at this time, said the release. It is also unknown how long Chew had been cooking meth at the motel.
One SWAT Team member suffered an injured knee during the raid.
Read more: http://www.tri-cityherald.com/2011/05/19/1496037/drugs-large-meth-lab-found-in.html#ixzz1MqYmFUy7
Sunday, May 15, 2011
Western Americana
We have a rather large collection of Western Americana that we acquired from one John Brunt of Walla Walla, Washington. Brunt owned and operated a bookstore in Glendale, CA for many years before moving to Walla Walla, crafting beautiful custom slipcases for many of the books in his Western Americana collection numbering nearly a thousand titles. We have more of his books available for avid collectors!
Some of Brunt's other books are located in our Antiquarian & Collectible section.
Book featured: Keith Old Master of California by Brother Cornelius; Brother Cornelius G. P. Putnam's Sons 1942 Hardcover
Good
Two volume set in custom slipcase, clean text, tight bindings, very light wear to exterior, corners, edges and covers. We have a rather large collection of Western Americana that we acquired from one John Brunt of Walla Walla, Washington. Brunt owned and operated a bookstore in Glendale, CA for many years, crafting beautiful custom slipcases for many of the books in his Western Americana collection numbering nearly a thousand titles. We have more of his books available for avid collectors!
Price: 237.50 USD
Thursday, May 12, 2011
No More Nuclear Waste @ Hanford & The End of Nuclear
Hanford No Place for Nuclear Waste, Article from May of 2010 in the Spokesman Review: http://www.hoanw.org/uploads/hoanw/Apple-Waldref%20op-ed%20in%20Spokesman%20Review%205-29-10.pdf
Excerpt:
To protect the Columbia River and
public health, Washington state
should join in requiring the Department of Energy to:
• Remove the wastes from leaky
single-shell tanks as fast as possible
– and not delay emptying tanks until
2040.
• Clean up, not cap and cover up,
contamination spreading from tank
leaks and discharges.
• Clean up, not cover up, the 40
miles of unlined burial grounds
• Withdraw the decisions to use
Hanford as a national radioactive
waste dump.
The End of Nuclear - http://www.worldwatch.org/node/8069
Excerpt:
New Worldwatch Institute Report, Timed in Conjunction with Chernobyl Anniversary, Shows Nuclear Industry Was in Decline Even Before Fukushima
Washington, D.C.—Even before the disaster in Fukushima, the world’s nuclear industry was in clear decline, according to a new report from the Worldwatch Institute. The report, which Worldwatch commissioned months before the Fukushima crisis began, paints a bleak picture of an aging industry unable to keep pace with its renewable energy competitors.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
Update on West Coast Radiation
If anyone has any other news sources, or references/ideas, anything, please let me know. Thanks!
Friday, May 6, 2011
America's Atomic Time Bomb: Hanford Nuclear Waste Still Poses Serious Risks
By Marc Pitzke in New York
The disaster at Fukushima has raised questions around the world about nuclear safety. But contamination is much worse in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. The former plutonium plant in Hanford, Washington is one of the most contaminated places on earth, and still decades from being cleaned up.
The lambs were born without eyes or mouths. Some had legs that had grotesquely grown together; others had no legs at all. Many were stillborn. Thirty-one were lost in a single night.
On a pasture nearby, a cow was found dead, stiff and with its hooves bizarrely stretched up into the whispering wind. Down by the river, men of the Yakama tribe pulled three-eyed salmon from the Columbia. Trout were covered in cancerous ulcers.
And then the babies started getting sick... More...
GO TO THE PUBLIC HEARING IN PORTLAND ON MAY 19th:
| Event: | PUBLIC HEARING ON THE DRAFT ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT FOR THE DISPOSAL OF GREATER-THAN-CLASS C (GTCC) LOW-LEVEL RADIOACTIVE WASTE AND GTCC-LIKE WASTE | ||||
| Location: | Doubletree Hotel, 1000 NE Multnomah Street | ||||
| City: | Portland, Oregon | ||||
| Start: | 5:30pm | ||||
| End: | 9:30pm | ||||
A public hearing on the GTCC draft EIS will be held in Portland, Oregon on May 19, 2011.
| |||||
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Double Trouble: Twins in Literature
From ABE:
It’s amazing how many novelists use twins as key characters in their books or attempt to explore the complex relationships between twins in their plots.
Romulus and Remus, Artemis and Apollo, and Castor and Pollux have long been left behind in history and mythology. In recent decades, there have been numerous novels featuring identical twins, evil twins, separated at birth twins, warring twins, twin sleuths, imprisoned twins, twins that are not twins and so on.
To novelists, twins can be very bad, very misunderstood, very mysterious and sometimes badly mistreated. In fact, it would be fair to argue that twins get a bad rap from most writers.
One thing is clear - twins are never dull in literature. Audrey Niffenegger, Wally Lamb, Pat Conroy, Arundhati Roy, V.C. Andrews and Madeleine L’Engle are just a few of the authors to have turned to twins.
This mostly dark selection of twin-themed books does not include the Bobbsey Twins and other gentle interpretations of twin life.
If you're a twin, tell us about your reading habits. Do authors represent twins fairly in literature? Do you share the same taste in books as your twin? Email us.
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
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