Who’s Gonna Write Chick Flicks Now?

Nora Ephron (1941-2012), Thanks and Goodbye (Photo credit: k-ideas)

I’m sure that lovers of chick flicks heard of the passing of Nora Ephron. I was greatly saddened. I really loved her work. She created characters that I loved. I can watch her work over and over again. I laugh and cry and have this feeling that I just can’t explain while watching. It’s like a longing. And now there’s not going to be any new Nora Ephron works. It’s sad.

So I wonder if there is anyone out there who is going to pick up Nora’s torch and carry on? I wish I could. I will admit she has inspired me to write better and try to improve. I admire her style. I would love to do better and be somewhat close to her level.

 

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• Chick flick movie Writer/Director Nora Ephron dies at age 71 (examiner.com)
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I Learned Something New

I love learning. And I will admit there is a lot I don’ t know. Today I learned new things about what I shouldn’t be feeding my cats. I know realistically I shouldn’t be feeding them junk. But it’s really hard when they beg. They’re so precious. How can I say no?  Then there is also the fact that they tag team me, too. One distracts while the other steals food.

So I went to the Foster and Smith website and found this list of things to not feed your cats. Pretty intense,  huh? I have to admit, my girls love mushrooms. They also love various vegetables such as olives, which other sites have also warned me to not feed them. They love canned tuna. Chloe absolutely will attack you for avocado and I have heard that it will kill cats. I have to constantly watch these girls! Be careful with your babies.

Items to avoid	Reasons to avoid
Alcoholic beverages	Can cause intoxication, coma, and death.
Baby food	Can contain onion powder, which can be toxic to cats fed baby food for an extended period of time. (Please see onion below.) Can also result in nutritional deficiencies, if fed in large amounts.
Bones from fish, poultry, or other meat sources	Can cause obstruction or laceration of the digestive system.
Canned tuna (for human consumption)	Large amounts can cause malnutrition, since it lacks proper levels of vitamins and minerals. It can also lead to thiamine deficiency (see ‘Fish’ below).
Chocolate, coffee, tea, and other caffeine	Contain caffeine, theobromine, or theophylline, which can cause vomiting and diarrhea and be toxic to the heart and nervous system.
Citrus oil extracts	Can cause vomiting.
Dog food	If accidental ingestion, will not cause a problem; if fed repeatedly, may result in malnutrition and diseases affecting the heart.
Fat trimmings	Can cause pancreatitis.
Fish (raw, canned or cooked)	If fed exclusively or in high amounts can result in a thiamine (a B vitamin) deficiency leading to loss of appetite, seizures, and in severe cases, death.
Grapes, raisins and currants	Contain an unknown toxin, which can damage the kidneys.
Human vitamin supplements containing iron	Can damage the lining of the digestive system and be toxic to the other organs including the liver and kidneys.
Macadamia nuts	Contain an unknown toxin, which can affect the digestive and nervous systems and muscle.
Marijuana	Can depress the nervous system, cause vomiting, and changes in the heart rate.
Milk and other dairy products	Some adult cats and dogs may develop diarrhea if given large amounts of dairy products.
Moldy or spoiled food, garbage	Can contain multiple toxins causing vomiting and diarrhea and can also affect other organs.
Mushrooms	Can contain toxins, which may affect multiple systems in the body, cause shock, and result in death.
Onions and garlic (raw, cooked, or powder)	Contain sulfoxides and disulfides, which can damage red blood cells and cause anemia. Cats are more susceptible than dogs. Garlic is less toxic than onions.
Persimmons	Seeds can cause intestinal obstruction and enteritis.
Raw eggs	Contain an enzyme called avidin, which decreases the absorption ofbiotin (a B vitamin). This can lead to skin and hair coat problems. Raw eggs may also contain Salmonella.
Raw meat	May contain bacteria such as Salmonella and E. coli, which can cause vomiting and diarrhea.
Rhubarb leaves	Contain oxalates, which can affect the digestive, nervous, and urinary systems.
Salt	If eaten in large quantities it may lead to electrolyte imbalances.
String	Can become trapped in the digestive system; called a “string foreign body.“
Sugary foods	Can lead to obesity, dental problems, and possibly diabetes mellitus.
Table scraps (in large amounts)	Table scraps are not nutritionally balanced. They should never be more than 10% of the diet. Fat should be trimmed from meat; bones should not be fed.
Tobacco	Contains nicotine, which affects the digestive and nervous systems. Can result in rapid heart beat, collapse, coma, and death.
Yeast dough	Can expand and produce gas in the digestive system, causing pain and possible rupture of the stomach or intestines.

Related articles

• Cat digestive system diagram (normanfolse.typepad.com)

My Life and Part of My Politics

So I was reading something today that just really bothered me. Because I sometimes lean to the left politically, some people assume (and you know what it makes you when you ASSume) that I am anti-God and  anti-country. Lemme just clear the air on this. I lean to the left because I believe in social programs. Why? Because I believe in helping others. Why? Because my religious beliefs (yes, I am a Christian) are so strong that I feel that we should live by what it says, which is to help others. Another reason is that without those wonderful social programs I wouldn’t have gotten the medical help I greatly needed as a child and couldn’t afford. So before people spout off about how un-American I am, I would like for them to ask WHY I believe the way I do.

So here’s Amy’s story: I was born with a cleft palate. Thankfully it was just my palate. Typically it affects more than just the palate. Approximately 2,600 children are born in the United States with a cleft palate only each year. That’s very few people considering the number of births annually. I was born in 1971. They weren’t really looking for it and thankfully mine wasn’t gaping. But it caused severe medical problems. I wasn’t diagnosed with the cleft until I was five years old. Medical difficulties from the cleft palate include problems with swallowing, choking, ear, nose, throat, dental, speech, and hearing problems. Guess what. I had all of those.

We were poor. We didn’t have insurance. In order to get help, Mama would pack me up and take me to what was called the Alabama Crippled Children’s Clinic. We didn’t call it disabled back then. No, it was an ugly word for the problems that people dealt with: crippled. And let me tell you what, I was lucky! There were people there that were going through hell on earth. I saw one family there that had survived a house fire. I still cry at the pain those people endured. They were wrapped in bandages as they waited in that hot, crowded waiting room while people stared at them like they were freaks.

The clinic was only open once a month on certain days of the week and you couldn’t get an appointment. It was first come, first serve unless you had surgery. Mama and I got there early and packed a lunch. It was 1976. There were no cell phones or fast food. You couldn’t leave to go grab a bite to eat or you’d lose your place in line. I had to sit there and behave for the day. The place was tense. Nobody wanted to be there, but we all needed to be there.

When my diagnosis of a cleft palate was finally given, it was a relief for my parents. There was finally an answer for what was going on with me. There was a reason I choked so easily. There was a reason I stayed sick all the time. But what to do? The answer was surgery. The roof of my mouth didn’t develop properly and hadn’t closed during development and was the culprit. It needed repaired. This was not a simple surgery. It wasn’t a cheap surgery. Thankfully, due to social programs, the State of Alabama paid for it. I had a wonderful surgeon, Dr. George Walker. I may have been five years old, but I still remember his name. He was such a good man. The only thing I would have changed about how things were done was I would have explained what was going to happen. Nobody really did that and it scared me to death. I didn’t have a clue. If I had known, it would have been a lot easier to handle. I had surgery on my mouth and was unable to talk for quite a while because of the fear of the strain it would cause. I think I couldn’t talk for almost two weeks. I was five and couldn’t spell. Thankfully I loved to draw and I was pretty good at charades. I could only eat soft food for six weeks. I ate more scrambled eggs, mashed potatoes, soup, and ice cream than you could imagine. You’d think that I would hate those foods now, but they are now my comfort foods.

After the surgery there was still work to be done. Just because the roof of my mouth was repaired, it didn’t mean I was suddenly all better. No. I had learned to speak with that hole in mouth. I had to go through speech therapy. Is that cheap? No. Again, social programs! I had to go to speech therapy at least once a week for several months after surgery. I had to learn how to force those sounds to come out a different way. It was frustrating. I had spoken this way for years. I even had to go to speech therapy in school the first year I entered public school.

Without social programs I would still have a hole in the roof of my mouth. I could have suffered deafness. I did have several ear infections which did considerable damage to my ears. I have had to have tubes in my ears more than once. And just because my palate was fixed when I was five, doesn’t mean there weren’t other problems. Because the palate didn’t close properly when I was developing, it caused the sinus cavities and eustachian tubes to be somewhat off as well. I still suffer sinus issues to this day, which we can’t say are related to the cleft palate or just climate. I have had two surgeries because of sinus issues and really need surgery for my deviated septum but after two previous painful surgeries and lack of funds, I am just not sure about undergoing that much pain again. Whenever I have had to have a new doctor examine me, they have been amazed at the work on the roof of my mouth. They have seen few cases of cleft palates and my plastic surgeon did excellent work.

So this is my story.

Is the left unChristian? I don’t think it always is, just as I don’t think all right wingers are always very Christian. But I do believe social programs are very Christian. Galatians 6:2 “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.” Proverbs 19:17 “Whoever is generous to the poor lends to the Lord, and he will repay him for his deed.”

Am I anti-Country? No way! I am so proud of my country my heart could burst. I admit not everything is perfect, but nothing ever is. I love the United States of America! I can’t imagine living anywhere else and I am blessed and lucky to live here. God bless America!

______________________________________________________________________

If you want to find out more information about cleft palates, you can visit the March of Dimes website and see what they have to say about it. It explains things better than I can.

Related articles

• Cleft Lip/Palate Cause Much More Than Cosmetic Problems (medicalnewstoday.com)
• Cleft Palate (walterdgraciamd.wordpress.com)
• Why Women Lean Left (aleksandreia.com)

Don’t Let Your Life Pass You By

There are a few common things that humans seem to crave: love, security and remembrance. We all want to be loved. We all want and need security of some sort. And we all want to be remembered. The first two are pretty self-explanatory. The third can be a little tricky, though.

Remembrance? How? Why? Some people want to leave their mark on the world. Some people hope to be remembered by those they loved. So I was thinking about this. This time of year always brings up these kinds of thoughts for me; it’s the median time period for the deaths of my parents. Just recently I “celebrated” the anniversary of my mother’s death and the anniversary of my father’s is in two weeks. They are remembered.

If I died tomorrow, I don’t know that I would be remembered. When I thought about that, it just hit me. Then, of course, I started playing a soundtrack in my head. It seems like everything in life has a song. This one was “I Will Remember You” by Sarah McLachlan. Very appropriate, huh? One line in the song hits a nerve “don’t let your life pass you by.” Wow.

I know I want to be remembered positively. I would like to be remembered one day for my good heart and my ability to create something beautiful. There are other things I would like to be remembered for as well, but I’m definitely not willing to open up to the world that much here. Gotta keep some secrets. So I guess my goal is to work on being remembered.

Summer Colds Suck!

Original caption: Not faked. I was trying to take a hankie photo cos I have a cold and sneezed! (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I have been sneezing my head off for two days. At work they act like I have the plague. My cats are terrified every time I sneeze because I sneeze like a cartoon character. They’re not petite little feminine sneezes. Oh no! They’re monster sneezes that build lots of pressure before just bursting forth and make this AAAACHOOOO sound like you wouldn’t believe. I sneezed so hard earlier I thought I pulled something. Lord have mercy I hate a cold!

On top of the sneezing, my nose is red and is getting raw. I have been using my Puffs Plus, but I got them too late I think. And I want to know how in the world a nose can be runny and stuffy all at the same time? I never figured that one out. My eyes are watering like crazy. My ears are popping. My throat is a tad sore.

So now that I have whined about my terrible, horrible cold, I am going to watch Master Chef and go to bed.

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