Found an Odd Obsolete Object in my Driveway

I walked out my front door last Saturday morning and there it was. Despite the fact that I hadn’t seen anything quite like it in the last couple of years I recognized it right away. Some memories are like that, lingering in the back of your mind, waiting to pop back into the present at the drop of a hint. It was early and foggy out yet I still I gave a quick look up and down the street before bending over to retrieve it. I tossed it on the bench in our entry way and went on to the kitchen to make some coffee without giving it another thought…until today. On my way to the throne I grabbed it of the bench, pulled it out of the plastic bag, and unrolled it. I noticed right off that last weekend’s headlines seemed a bit less sensational than the stuff that had been trending on MSN and such, as of late. There were live butterflies in a butterfly enclosure in Brunswick for CoastFest. A 12 year old boy saved his four siblings and mother from a fire that destroyed their home. Dancers, Bikinis, and Football, Too featured info and opinion on the Jaguars’ new swimming pools and other entertainment at EverBank Field during their last home game. A woman from Brunswick, Katrina Elkins, pleaded guilty to making a false statement to police officers and was sentenced to five years in prison. Ok, I may as well admit it, I miss the old obsolete paper copy of the news, newspaper, especially the Sudoku, the Crossword, and the Jumble.

Grab a Little (or large) Cup of Happiness

Good news! There has been a lot of talk lately about the closing of The Thirsty Monkey, but I am here to put those rumors to rest. The Thirsty Monkey has new owners (a last minute reprieve) and yes, coffee lovers, you will still be able to go grab a little (or large) cup of happiness there! I stopped by and got my usual medium roast and it was wonderful. I also got my coffee card punched too so I am happily working toward another free cup in the near future. If you have had a hankering for pumpkin spice latte (especially before or after you visit or even just pass by the adjacent pumpkin patch), they make a yummy one at The Thirsty Monkey too. One of the new owners is a dear friend, Andrea Hilt of local movie theater fame. She has done so much for our community (providing popcorn for all those class parties for my students over the years, for one thing), so please come out and support her in this new venture. If you already are a regular at The Thirsty Monkey, I know I’m preaching to the choir but if you haven’t stopped out there, now is the time to check them out. They are located just past the light at Walmart betwixt the Honda place and Kings Bay Flowers and enjoy a cup of happiness!

Coffee Lover Gene

If you know me or my husband, you probably know we have this gene. Researchers have analyzed genetic data from 120,000 coffee drinkers of European and African-American ancestry and they have found not one, but eight places on the human genome linked to coffee drinking. In the past only two locations had been identified as links so this new data gives more credence to the idea that there is a coffee lover gene, that and further evidence that a hit of caffeine is what motivates regular coffee consumption. Drinking coffee is linked to a couple of things that make drinking coffee favorable in my opinion, lower risk of type 2 diabetes, liver disease, and Parkinson's disease. The truth is I just really like coffee so much that I never go a day without it. And then there are two more newly identified genes involved in how the body processes caffeine, the POR and ABCG2. These encode proteins involved in caffeine metabolism. For our children that don’t love coffee (and there are a couple of them too) they definitely have an affinity for caffeine. That may be a genetic predisposition we’ve passed on to them since the love of coffee and its caffeine and the love of caffeine (however you get it) are closely linked. Sorry to cut this short but that’s it, I need to end this post here and go grab a cup of coffee J

I Spyware

So on one hand the government is cracking down on the maker of one spyware tool manufacturer with illegal wiretapping charges (the makers of StealthGenie), while the other hand, a fairly large number of police departments (more than 200 departments in 35 states), are handing out spyware that is nearly identical to the banned stuff, for free to parents so they can install it and use it to track their kids on line. Police departments have purchased this with confiscated drug money, not tax payer dollars, and distributed it - spyware called ComputerCOP. Besides the obvious issue of people using ComputerCOP to cyber stalk people other than their own children like roommates, coworkers, or spouses, the spyware transmits data in an insecure method. This can be easily accessed by people with the know-how and technology giving them the opportunity to sniff the unencrypted traffic across a wireless network and capture the content, including usernames, passwords, Social Security numbers and credit card numbers that the target may be typing. In light of these recent revelations about this spyware by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, EFF, parents are now being urged not to use the keystroke logging feature, due to the privacy and security issues. Ever heard of squeezing all the toothpaste out of a tube and then trying to stuff it all back in? Yep, similar problem here with something much larger than a tube of toothpaste.

Let Me Take a Belfie

A friend sent me a link to a video, a commercial actually, in which Dr. Oz had everyone in his audience stand up and take a belfie. A belfie is a selfie of one’s very own belly. I like this new word, belfie, but the belly shrinking capsulized supplement, not so much. I have found portion controlled clean eating of healthy home cooked food and exercise works just fine as a belly fat shrinker. As a matter of fact I have been practicing just that and over the past year my belly has shrunk by several inches. But from here on out, every time I’m tempted to go the fast food route, and I am occasionally tempted to go for convenience, I’m gonna stop and tell myself, Let me  take a belfie!

Some Stuff I Didn’t Know about my Passport

I read an article about 7 little known facts about passports and since I have one I figured I’d check it out. My passport has a chip in it (a biometric identifier-electronic picture of my face) as do all passports issued after 2007 and I had no idea. My passport is a traditional 28 page passport, but I didn’t know that I could get 52 page one when I renew or if it’s your first time ordering ditto-you can get 52 pages at no additional charge! I did know that passports need to be renewed every ten years because I've renewed mine once since 1999. My passport gives me free access to 172 countries, but some countries require 2 to 4 blank pages before entering. Fall is the best time to get a passport or to renew one because that’s when applications are at their lowest before Thanksgiving and holiday travel times. So fall is the best since passports get processed the fastest. Time to get busy if you are planning to visit any of those 172 countries and get your passport application in…and you can take your own passport photo (I wish I had) as long as it’s on a white background! 

Breakfast

My husband always says breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and he definitely has a point there. For adults, skipping breakfast has been proven to raise the risk of obesity and type 2 diabetes and now there is evidence that the same could go for breakfast skipping children. Researchers collected data on 4000 children ages 9 and 10. The info included how often the kids had breakfast, measurements of their body fat and blood samples. The kids that regularly skipped breakfast had 26 per cent higher levels of insulin resistance, which leads to type 2 diabetes, than the kids that ate breakfast every day. These weren't randomized controlled trials so this study doesn't scientifically prove that skipping breakfast as children leads to obesity and type 2 diabetes, but common sense would lead me to agree with my husband. I know if he reads this it he’ll smile at the idea that I agree on something with him, especially the most important (and maybe his favorite) meal of the day so don’t skip it and don’t let your kids skip it either!