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Luby's Cafeteria serves up message of hope, renewal

April 22, 1992|By Daniel Cattau | Daniel Cattau,Dallas Morning News

KILLEEN, Texas -- Signs of new life abound in the central Texas countryside this time of year. Newborn lambs lie peacefully beside their mothers, calves take their first unsteady steps on the dark brown soil and bluebonnets congregate along highways.

Approaching this military-dominated city on U.S. 190, there are other signs of renewal, sometimes in mundane things -- people are once again heading into Luby's Cafeteria to have lunch and meet friends. For many residents of Killeen and surrounding towns, Easter's message of new life, hope and renewal was more than the belief that Jesus rose from the dead.

"We certainly can take the tragedy of this community and compare it to what happened to Jesus," said Linda L. Pulscher, 41, director of Home and Hope, a homeless shelter here.

"What has come through is a risen community and a changed community."

She and others said Killeen and the surrounding towns have become closer, more resilient and more caring in the six months since Oct. 16, when 25 people, including gunman George Hennard of nearby Belton, died in a shooting rampage at the cafeteria.

"A possible benefit of this shocking event may be the increase of our personal endurance and strength, as well as faith and love for each other," said Larry D. Robinson of Belton in an Oct. 27 letter to the Killeen Daily Herald.

But not every survivor or member of a victim's family has experienced a spiritual awakening, let alone a healing.

"Some doubt that there's a life after Luby's," said the Rev. Jimmy Towers, 48, pastor of First Baptist Church. "Some doubt that there's life after death. That's a reality."

For many survivors and families of the victims, however, life has been a series of little resurrections since the tragedy.

Hazel M. Holley, 70, who escaped through a broken back window at Luby's -- breaking her left wrist and spraining her left ankle -- said an important step in the healing process was the opportunity for the victims to visit Luby's in December after it had been cleaned up.

"We mingled together and learned things we didn't know before," said Ms. Holley, who found out at the gathering the identity of a young man who had helped her escape. But she still had nightmares and sleepless nights until Luby's reopened March 12.

"Now I go to bed and I just sleep," she said.

Although some people interviewed said they haven't been back to the cafeteria for fear "it would bring back memories," others said the remodeled Luby's testifies to the power of life over death.

"By reopening, we showed the tragedy of death is not a tragedy. The tragedy is to let it get to you," said John A. Marr, 29, an assistant general manager at Luby's.

Others, such as the Rev. John R. Birkmeyer, 67, pastor of St. Joseph Catholic Church and Killeen Police Department chaplain, even consider Luby's to be a sacred place.

"For me, Luby's is a hallowed place. It was the last place that these people had their last meal and talked with friends," Father Birkmeyer said. "And it was their jumping off point into eternity."

He anointed the dead amid the carnage in the cafeteria about two hours after Hennard drove his pickup truck through a full-length window and began his attack. Hennard killed himself at the scene.

Some survivors have not come to terms with what they witnessed that day.

"I am seeing classic post-traumatic stress syndrome" among some survivors, said the Rev. Lanny Geib, rector of St. Christopher's Episcopal Church and a Vietnam veteran. "They question God -- why wasn't it them? -- and they're not willing to deal with their pain. They sit and cry, angry at God and the world."

But Mr. Marr, the Luby's manager who helped his staff escape at the time of the tragedy, draws strength by remembering what happened.

"Any time a day's going bad, I just rub my back pocket," Mr. Marr said. There, he keeps the brass tip of a bullet -- a police bullet that was found embedded in a post at Luby's.

"No matter how bad things get in my mind, I know it's not that bad," he said. "If I can handle that [the shooting], I can handle anything."

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Arundel picks Zucco as new football coach

June 19, 1992|By Pat O'Malley | Pat O'Malley,Staff Writer

Longtime Arundel High jayvee coach and varsity assistant Bill Zucco has been selected as the new head football coach at the Gambrills school.

Zucco, who has been at the school since 1966 as a social studies instructor, succeeds Buddy Hepfer, who announced his resignation this spring after 15 seasons and overall record of 93-61 as the Wildcats' coach.

"We feel we hired the best man for the job in Bill," said Athletic Director Bernie Walter. "Bill has been around our program a long time, starting with the late Jerry Mears and then later working with Buddy Hepfer."

Zucco said he "never had any intention of replacing Buddy," but is "excited for the opportunity."

Zucco was one of five candidates interviewed for the position. Fellow assistants Bob Beauchemin and Dave Maka as well as Scott Cofiell and Rob Smith were interviewed by Walter and Principal Ken Catlin.

Cofiell, a former assistant in several sports at Brooklyn Park and Andover, has been coaching semipro football in Finland the past few years. Smith has been an assistant coach at both the John Carroll School in Harford County and Baltimore Polytechnic Institute.

Zucco was either jayvee head coach or an assistant in the Wildcats' program from 1966-1977 before stepping down. When Hepfer asked him to return in 1989, Zucco resumed the reins of the Wildcat jayvee. Two years ago his team was 10-0.

Last year's Arundel jayvee went 5-5, putting Zucco's career jayvee record at 55-14-1. In eight seasons as jayvee coach, Zucco won or shared five county championships.

The 50-year-old Zucco, who is assistant athletic director to Walter, was the Wildcats' head basketball coach from 1977-1983 and assisted in softball for four years.

"There is no question that Bill is very experienced and well-qualified for the position," said Walter.

Arundel (4-6 last fall) has not had a winning season since 1985 when Hepfer led them to a 9-2 mark.

"It's going to be a big challenge and I hope I can get the program back to where Buddy had it a few years ago," said Zucco.

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10 officers rescued in latest of city-housing problems

August 21, 1992|By Michael James and Alan J. Craver | Michael James and Alan J. Craver,Staff Writers

The latest from Baltimore's public high-rise housing projects: 10 police officers, pinned down by sniper fire, had to be rescued yesterday by an armored car as gunmen fired shots from upper floors.

A week earlier, 9-year-old Ebony Scott was murdered and left in a trash bin at George B. Murphy Homes, another city-owned housing project. And a week before that, a drug user was shot to death in a robbery at the same building.

This year, at least six people have been slain at city high-rise projects. Residents at Murphy Homes even marched to City Hall Wednesday to demand better security.

But for housing officials, who say they are trying to come up with ways to battle the rampant crime, it seems to be a losing cause.

"What can we do? When you have police officers pinned down by snipers firing automatic weapons, and it takes a tank to rescue them, what the hell do you do?" said one city housing official, who asked not to be identified. The same official has been dealing with security concerns from Ebony Scott's murder. "This is a massive, massive problem that we cannot control," the official said."

When police made it inside Flag House Courts yesterday, along the 100 block of Albemarle St., the snipers had fled -- almost

surely to their apartments, police said.

Police said they believe about a half-dozen shots were fired from two of the Flag House Courts buildings, apparently in protest of officers who made a minor drug arrest at 1:30 a.m. on the street below.

An armored vehicle from the Prince George's County Police Department was brought in to help rescue the officers, eight from the city Police Department and two from the city Housing Authority, during a standoff that lasted about five hours.

The vehicle, similar to ones sent to the Persian Gulf war last year, was used "just to insure there was a safe evacuation of those officers," police spokesman Sam Ringgold said.

No one was injured, and it still isn't known whether the snipers were shooting at police or just firing in the air. No bullets or shell casings were found, Mr. Ringgold said.

The incident started after an off-duty police officer saw a passenger in a car flash a gun, Mr. Ringgold said. The officer called for backup, and two people in the car were seen making a drug deal in the 1100 block of E. Lombard St., he said.

Two people were arrested, and moments later, shots began ringing out from the buildings, which overlook the street, police said.

Officers took cover around the building and finally were rescued by the six-wheeled, 7-ton armored vehicle several hours later.

Prince George's Sgt. Chuck Cooke said his department often loans the vehicle to other police agencies. It can go 60 mph and was driven to Baltimore yesterday by highway.

Hours after the vehicle was used in the Lombard Street incident, it was put to work in a Prince George's County field, where a man was holding a gun to his head, Sergeant Cooke said. The vehicle allowed officers to get close enough to talk to the man without endangering themselves, he said.

Bill Toohey, a city Housing Authority spokesman, acknowledged that crime problems have reached a serious level at the four city-owned high-rises: Flag House in East Baltimore, Murphy Homes and Lexington Terrace in West Baltimore, and Lafayette Courts in East Baltimore.

He said the small Housing Authority police force -- he refused to specify their numbers -- is overwhelmed by the drug-related crime.

A private, unarmed security force was removed last year from the buildings because it had no effect on crime, Mr. Toohey said. In fact, drug dealers often fired at the guards sitting behind bulletproof glass, and from time to time, they punctured the glass, Mr. Toohey said.

At Murphy Homes, housing officials are planning new security measures in response to residents' requests, including turnstiles the doors, an intercom system and resident security patrols.

But those measures, officials said, are not going to stop the crime.

New strategies aren't unusual for dealing with crime at the projects. On May 28, Housing Authority police officers armed with semiautomatic weapons arrested 10 people in a sweep of 109 units at Lafayette Courts. The sweep was designed to find drug dealers who were "holing up" in vacant apartments there.

Some drug dealers, they said, had moved furniture into the apartments and had even changed the locks.

Mr. Toohey said the "sweep" has resulted in a noticeable decline in drug activity at the complex -- but it is likely that the activity has merely shifted to Flag House, he said.

Many of the high-rises have vacancies despite the large demand -- about 30,000 people in Baltimore -- for public housing. People ,, cite fear and the complexes' bad reputations as their main reasons for refusing to accept apartments.

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NFL roundup: Texans DE Smith loses appeal

August 23, 2013|Reuters

The Sports Xchange

NFL roundup: Texans DE Smith loses appeal

Houston Texans defensive end Antonio Smith lost his suspension appeal and will miss the season opener, ESPN reported Friday.

Smith was suspended for forcing off the helmet of Miami Dolphins offensive lineman Richie Incognito and swinging it at him during the team's preseason game last Saturday.

Part of Smith's punishment is that he also has to miss the Texans' last two preseason games. He will lose about $400,000 in salary.

Smith is allowed to practice through Aug. 30, but after that he is ineligible to participate in team activities until Sept. 10.

Houston opens the regular season Sept. 9 at the San Diego Chargers.

"In general, I feel disappointed, disappointed in myself that I was able to let him get to me in the way that he did that frustrated me, when knowing that that's his whole game, that's what he bases his skill level off of, and I let him take me down a road that led me into that path," Smith told KRIV-TV in Houston.

"Initially, I was full of frustration. I swung the helmet, but I didn't swing the helmet to hit Richie Incognito. If I was going to swing the helmet to hit Richie Incognito, it wouldn't have been hard. He's right there close. You can see how low the helmet was and how tight I brought it to my body."

Smith said Incognito started the altercation by hitting him in the facemask.

"It was a deliberate punch to my face," Smith said. "You see how far my head went back. It was a deliberate grab of my facemask, the twisting and the jerking of it and then one last punch at the end."

Smith and Incognito also had a confrontation during last year's preseason opener between the two teams. After the game, Smith complained that Incognito tried to injure his ankle. The NFL fined Smith $21,000 for kicking Incognito but it was reduced to $11,000 after an appeal.

---Former NFL wide receiver Terrell Owens is suing agent Drew Rosenhaus and his brother, Jason Rosenhaus, for $6.5 million.

According to Yahoo! Sports, Owens is seeking damages for breach of fiduciary duty, fraud, and negligence.

In the lawsuit, Owens claims that Rosenhaus introduced him to financial adviser Jeff Rubin and recommended that Owens hire Rubin to manage his finances. He alleges that the now-banned financial adviser poorly invested his money, including in an illegal and now-bankrupt casino project in Alabama.

Owens claims that the advice given by the Rosenhaus brothers and hiring Rubin caused him to lose nearly $5 million, and another $1.5 million in income could have been generated if invested properly.

Rosenhaus declined to comment.

---The Pittsburgh Steelers acquired running back Felix Jones from the Philadelphia Eagles for linebacker Adrian Robinson.

Jones was a first-round pick by the Dallas Cowboys in 2008. In five seasons with Dallas, Jones rushed for 2,728 yards with 11 touchdowns. He also caught 127 passes for 1,062 yards with three touchdowns.

Jones signed a one-year deal with the Eagles in May.

Robinson signed with the Steelers as an undrafted rookie free agent out of Temple in 2012. He played on special teams in 12 games last season.

---New York Giants general manager Jerry Reese told ESPN radio that David Wilson will start at running back in the Sept. 8 opener against the Dallas Cowboys.

Wilson and Andre Brown are both listed on the team's depth chart as starters, but Reese said Wilson will be on the field first when the Giants open the season.

"We expect (Wilson) to be our starter, and be in the backfield with Andre Brown, who had a terrific season going last year until he got hurt," Reese said. "(Brown's) had the injury bug a little bit since he's been in the league. But if he can stay healthy, and David Wilson comes on like we expect him too, we think we can have a pretty dynamic backfield."

---The San Diego Chargers announced they agreed to a contract with cornerback Richard Marshall. Terms were not disclosed.

Marshall played in four games last year with the Miami Dolphins and had 17 tackles, one interception and one pass breakup before a back injury ended his season.

The Dolphins cut Marshall this week after attempts to trade him failed. He had five tackles and one pass breakup in three preseason games. He signed a three-year, $16 million deal with Miami last year.

---The NFL pressured ESPN into pulling out of a joint project with PBS' Frontline in producing a documentary about concussions, according to the New York Times. The documentary is set to air on Oct. 8.

Frontline and ESPN had been working on the investigation into head injuries for more than a year. While it will be televised in October, ESPN was pressured into backing out of the project after a film trailer was released earlier this month, the Times reported.

According to the report, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, NFL Network president Steve Bornstein, ESPN president John Skipper and ESPN executive vice president for production John Wildhack met for lunch at Patroon, a Manhattan restaurant near the NFL's headquarters. League officials reportedly expressed their opposition to the direction of the documentary, which implied that the league was looking the other way from evidence that players were sustaining long-term brain trauma.

"At no time did we formally or informally ask them to divorce themselves from the project," NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said. "We know the movie was happening and the book was happening, and we respond to them as best we can. We deny that we pressured them."


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Famous last words

When artists like J.D. Salinger play hard-to-find, how much of the blame is ours?

September 11, 2013|Christopher Borrelli

Early on in "The Salinger Contract," the new book from acclaimed novelist and West Rogers Park native Adam Langer, the protagonist, a character also named "Adam Langer," stumbles across the truth about J.D. Salinger. He discovers why Salinger seemingly stopped writing in 1965, never to follow up on "The Catcher in the Rye," living out his remaining 45 years in reclusive silence and rarely straying from his hilltop home in New Hampshire. Even more incredibly: "Adam Langer" learns why Harper Lee never wrote anything after "To Kill a Mockingbird," why Truman Capote never delivered on the promise of "In Cold Blood," why Thomas Pynchon — though comparatively prolific, having published eight books since 1963 — is almost never seen in public.

Langer's book is a fever dream of speculative literary history, and lots of fun, and I won't spoil it. Though I should say … psst, Salinger and Co. went quiet because of a devious book dealer living on Lake Shore Drive.

Finally! An explanation!

"Which I came up with because there is no one compelling, satisfying reason to explain all of those famous literary mysteries," Langer said last week from his home in New York City. "But wouldn't it be nice if there were? Of course there is no one answer to why someone stops publishing or disappears from public life, why some people get paranoid, others get writer's block. So I have this fictional reason — this pure fantasy."

But as good a reason as any.

Because, when it comes to the mystery of why an important, resonant artist vanishes from the public eye or stops releasing new work — if there's anything to be learned from the mystery of J.D. Salinger (who died in 2010), it's that the mystery tends to metastasize, growing more enthralling than the reality behind it.

Certainly "The Salinger Contract" offers at least as compelling an explanation of the Salinger Myth as the extravagantly researched and generously hyped new documentary "Salinger," which opens Sept. 20 in Chicago. The film, which was directed by Shane Salerno — whose credits include co-writing "Armageddon" with Michael Bay — paints a portrait of a man damaged by World War II (Salinger's first day was D-Day), turned off by his own admirers, in the thrall of Vedanta Hinduism and not above cultivating his image as a hermit: As E.L. Doctorow says in the film, "Reclusivity is a great public relations device." Moreover, the doorstop of a companion biography (also titled "Salinger") that Salerno wrote with critic David Shields takes further pains to point out the lack of a smoking gun, describing Salinger's life as a "slow-motion suicide mission" influenced by everything from the author's ex-wives to his embarrassment at having one testicle.

"We take a particularly strong opinion that World War II is what made Salinger an artist," Salerno said in a phone interview. "So he spent his life seeking a cure for the damage that did to him. The evidence is clear."

And yet, after Salinger for decades represented the literary world's most persistent mystery, those answers are so …

Perhaps because the mystery of Salinger — whose Holden Caulfield telegraphed the author's growing misanthropy when he dreamed of building "a little cabin with the dough I made … near the woods" — had long ago became more compelling than whatever it might reveal about Salinger's work. Which is often true of any celebrated artist who walks away for whatever reason, choosing not to release new material for decades, disappearing from the media eye, refusing to grant interviews, insisting that only the work is what matters.

The mystery, the vanishing, becomes a placeholder for the person or new work we once expected.

If the artist is vital, that sudden silence grows louder still, becoming a cultural vacuum in which an increasingly mythic status takes form: Consider director Terrence Malick, who took 20 years to follow up on 1978's "Days of Heaven." Or Brian Wilson, whose personal issues removed his once ubiquitous presence. But then, they were absent for decades. The speed of cultural life now has meant that a David Bowie need only stop making records for 10 years to transform into a ghost. Dave Chappelle, who walked away from "Chappelle's Show" in 2005 and only recently returned to touring, had a legend attached to him in even less time.

Then there's Pynchon, whose new novel, "Bleeding Edge," comes out Tuesday. He serves as a reminder that an artist can release new work somewhat routinely while still acquiring the aura of a cultural recluse. His new book sits here on my desk, the name across its cover kind of startling, an awkward reminder that Pynchon, who has proved famously media-shy and slippery to photographers, remains out there, somewhere.


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Pleasure Flying in Urban Areas

March 14, 1987

Now we can add a professor of biology to the large assortment of aviation experts with obvious solutions to skies crowded with leather-helmeted idiots, scarfs obscuring their vision, hell-bent on self-destruction and ready to take out anyone else in the sky or Sepulveda Boulevard.

After 25 years in general aviation-related business I do not claim the title of expert, nor can I claim to represent a constituency, but I assure one and all I am personally damn tired of the one-sided attack on all that is general aviation.

The vast majority of general aviation people agree that there is a serious problem and are even more concerned about an equitable and safe solution than the good professor in that if the unjust pendulum swings too far, the industry and, yes the benefits to the general public, would be lost.

What general aviation is trying to say is that we need:

--More clearly defined and easily understood control and practice areas.

--Better equipment and working environment for the controllers who most feel are doing a superior job in a pressure cooker atmosphere.

--Better supervision of flight schools and maintenance facilities to assure the proper level of competence.

Many general aviation aircraft are used by and for business purposes, enhancing the economy of local areas and affording income for many related industries.

The majority of people do not realize the depressed state of general aviation. Pleasure flying by definition is less and less a factor for many reasons, most economical, and in fact is already moving to outlying airports.

Where are the airline pilots of the future to come from if not general aviation? They can not all come out of the military.

San Juan Capistrano

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YOU ARE HERE: LAT HomeCollectionsMergers

State Seeking Action Against Main Hurdman : Partner Says California Plans Aren't Threatened

April 09, 1987|From Reuters

SAN FRANCISCO — California regulators are seeking disciplinary action against the accounting firm KMG Main Hurdman, but the move should not jeopardize the California activities of its new partner, Peat, Marwick, Mitchell & Co, a spokesman for the world's largest accounting firm said Wednesday.

"It is the opinion of our legal counsel that this in no way affects the activities of Peat, Marwick in California," Peat, Marwick spokesman John Higgins told Reuters.

"The action was brought against Main Hurdman on March 31, its last day of doing business before the merger," Higgins noted. "It is the opinion of our legal counsel that Peat, Marwick will continue to operate in California under the Peat, Marwick certification."

World's Largest

KMG Main Hurdman merged last week with Peat, Marwick, Mitchell of New York to become the world's largest accounting firm. Peat, Marwick's revenue in 1986 stood at $1.3 billion.

California regulators are seeking disciplinary action ranging from censure to revocation of the San Francisco-based firm's license to do business in California. The action stems from a 1985 audit of Technical Equities Corp., an investment firm that filed for bankruptcy last year.

The Peat, Marwick spokesman said: "We were aware that there were certain legal matters and we did a fairly careful investigation. We saw no reason not to go ahead with the merger."

A spokeswoman for the California Board of Accountancy, which certifies public accountants and firms in the state, said Tuesday a six-page complaint was filed against Main Hurdman, which had about 400 partners and a work force of 3,800 to 4,000.

"We basically charged that the Technical Equities audit was not conducted in accordance with generally accepted auditing standards," Della Bousquet, executive officer for the board, said.

She said a hearing probably would be held before an administrative law judge within three months.

Favorable Opinion

Bousquet said the company was accused of not properly investigating financial transactions and of issuing a favorable opinion in August 1985 that relied on misrepresentations of Technical Equities management.

She said the accounting firm, although aware of Technical Equities' severe cash flow and liquidity problems, was accused of not performing a proper audit of it.

The complaint named four individuals, including two partners and two audit managers.

Technical Equities, based in San Jose, filed for protection under Chapter 11 of the bankruptcy laws in February 1986, listing debts of $69.7 million to 1,068 investors. Many of the investors were prominent sports and broadcasting figures.

Los Angeles Times Articles


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YOU ARE HERE: LAT HomeCollectionsDoctors

Cholesterol Treatment Guide Issued : Report Could Sharply Cut Heart Attacks, Federal Panel Says

October 06, 1987|MARLENE CIMONS | Times Staff Writer

WASHINGTON — For the first time, a federal advisory panel Monday issued specific recommendations to physicians for treating people with high levels of blood cholesterol, saying that the guidelines, if followed, could prevent as many as 300,000 heart attacks every year.

"Medical practice is going to undergo a major change as a result of this report," said Dr. DeWitt S. Goodman, professor of medicine at Columbia University in New York, chairman of the committee. "It will have a large impact on coronary heart disease and the public health."

Lack of 'Practical Guidance'

Although information about cholesterol-lowering therapy has been available, many physicians "were deterred" from using it because they lacked "practical guidance about how to go about it," the panel said.

About 25% of Americans between 20 and 74 years old have high blood cholesterol, or roughly one out of four adults, the panel said, which "translates into at least 40 million people who need further evaluation or possible treatment."

About 1.5 million Americans suffer heart attacks every year, resulting in 500,000 deaths, according to the federal government's National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute.

The panel, which was convened by the institute, called dietary treatment the cornerstone of therapy to reduce blood cholesterol levels and said that cholesterol-lowering drugs should be used only on those with the highest risk or when diets fail. Further, the committee said, other risk factors, such as obesity, cigarette smoking, high blood pressure, being male or having a family history of premature heart disease, should be taken into consideration when determining treatment.

The panel set a single standard for measuring high cholesterol for everyone 20 or older--a change from the practice of modifying risk by age. The committee classified total blood cholesterol of 240 milligrams per deciliter of blood or above as "high blood cholesterol," with levels of 200 to 239 considered "borderline high blood cholesterol." Levels below 200 were classified as "desirable blood cholesterol."

Total blood cholesterol is composed of high-density lipoprotein, or HDL cholesterol, the so-called good cholesterol, which has an inverse relationship to heart disease, and low-density lipoprotein, or LDL cholesterol, which has been implicated in the development of heart disease. LDL cholesterol "is the key index for therapy," the panel said.

The panel recommended that all Americans over 20 have their total cholesterol measured at least once every five years and that those who are classified "borderline" have the test repeated. If they have no heart disease or other risk factors, the panel said, they should be given dietary information and retested a year later. If they do have risk factors, they should undergo more specific testing to determine their LDL cholesterol levels.

Those with total cholesterol of 240 or higher should also undergo more specific LDL cholesterol analysis, the panel said. LDL levels of 130 to 159 are classified as "borderline high-risk LDL cholesterol," and levels of more than 160 are considered "high-risk LDL cholesterol," the report said.

The panel said that patients with high-risk LDL levels and those with borderline high-risk LDL levels plus heart disease or two other risk factors need "intensive medical intervention" and should be given cholesterol-lowering treatment.

Dietary therapy should occur in two stages, the panel said. During the first phase, the panel said, the patient should consume no more than 30% of his total calories in fat, including no more than 10% in saturated fat and less than 300 milligrams a day in dietary cholesterol. The second phase requires further reductions of saturated fat to less than 7% of total calories and cholesterol intake to less than 200 milligrams a day.

Foods high in dietary cholesterol include egg yolks, cheeses, pork and liver. Foods high in saturated fat include butter, whole milk, cream, ice cream, cheeses, beef fat and pork fat. In addition, three plant oils--palm oil, palm kernel oil and coconut oil--are especially rich in saturated fatty acids.

The panel, acknowledging that the second stage of the dietary therapy may be difficult to follow, suggested that patients enlist the aid of a registered dietitian.

The committee urged that "maximal efforts" at dietary therapy should be made before initiating drug therapy because "drug therapy is likely to continue for many years, or for a lifetime in a given patient."

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YOU ARE HERE: LAT HomeCollectionsRescues

1 of 2 Horses in Freeway Wreck Saved

January 26, 1988

A score of firefighters, Highway Patrol officers, Caltrans workers and a veterinarian worked frantically for almost four hours Monday in an effort to save two quarter horses trapped in a trailer that had turned over on the Golden State Freeway.

Northbound traffic was stalled for almost two hours while workers sawed the roof off the overturned vehicle to reach the animals trapped in the wreckage, one on top of the other. Only one horse survived, however.

Bishop horseman Frank Ormiston, 42, who had spent the weekend in the Los Angeles area, was on his way back home when his truck and trailer was rear-ended near Colorado Boulevard by a hit-and-run driver. The trailer broke loose from the truck and flipped over several times, California Highway Patrol officers said.

"When we arrived, the horse on top was kicking and beating up on the bottom one . . .," said Los Angeles Fire Capt. Philip Hobson. "We've seen some unusual things on the freeway, but this was really different."

Dr. John Toma, a veterinarian specialist in equestrian medicine, was one of thousands of commuters caught in the mess.

"I . . . wondered what was holding us up. And then I saw the horse trailer on its side . . . then I saw the rears of the horses, and thought, 'Oh no!' "

He said he gave the horses a light sedative to calm them.

The horse on top was able to get to its feet and was led to a nearby grassy area, but the other died during the rescue attempt.

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Clippers Are Making Progress, Lose by Only 18 : Nuggets Can't Equal 46-Point Opening-Game Margin but Score 124-106 Win

January 31, 1988|CHRIS BAKER | Times Staff Writer

DENVER — The Clippers opened their season here in November with a 46-point loss to the Denver Nuggets.

So, their return visit Saturday night could be viewed as some indicator of their progress. In this case, progress meant losing by only 18 points, 124-106.

No one ever said progress comes quickly for the Clippers, who have lost 5 straight and 19 of their last 21.

"The season-opening game was one of those games where we were high emotionally," Denver Coach Doug Moe said. "I think the Clippers are going to be a good team. They just don't have any confidence."

It's difficult, however, to have faith in a team that plays no defense and doesn't rebound.

"The first time we played here we weren't ready to play," said Clipper Coach Gene Shue after seeing his club lose its 15th consecutive road game. "We're better now, but we're still not good enough to win. We just have too many holes."

The Clippers were defenseless against the Nuggets, the NBA's top offensive team. At times, Denver looked like it was running a layup drill.

"We didn't get back on defense, and they got layup after layup," Clipper captain Mike Woodson said.

Forward Alex English (22 points) and guard Lafayete (Fat) Lever (25 points, 10 rebounds, 9 assists) showed why they have been selected as starters in the National Basketball Assn. All-Star game next weekend in Chicago.

"We were down a little bit, but Doug let us know that we couldn't take the Clippers for granted," Lever said.

And the Clippers let Michael Adams, the Nuggets' pint-sized point guard, roam from baseline to baseline. Adams scored 14 points and was credited with 12 assists.

"Michael Adams played real well," Lever said. "With Mike running around and making steals, it gets us going as well as the fans."

Forward Blair Rasmussen and center Dan Schayes, who had 18 points apiece, scored at will inside. And Schayes grabbed 15 rebounds as the Nuggets out-rebounded the Clippers, 59-41.

Clipper center Benoit Benjamin, who blocked 10 shots to set a franchise record in Friday night's 97-88 loss to Milwaukee, returned to normal.

Benjamin had 12 points, 4 rebounds, 1 blocked shot and 1 assist in 23 minutes as Shue took him into and out of the lineup because he wasn't playing aggressive defense, failed to rebound and took low percentage jump shots.

Benjamin said his injured left knee gave him trouble because he didn't get a chance to get warm. He got cold on the bench, where he sat for the entire fourth quarter.

"I was being shuffled in and out so much that my knee stiffened up," Benjamin said. "I felt it I would have played more I would have done better."

Guards Quintin Dailey and Woodson provided offense for the Clippers.

Dailey came off the bench to score 21 points in 24 minutes, and Woodson had 20 points. Forward Michael Cage had 15 points and 15 rebounds.

Dailey has been the Clippers' most effective offensive weapon recently, averaging 21 points in the last two games.

However, Shue doesn't plan to move him into the starting lineup.

"I'm just doing my job," Dailey said. "He (Shue) has to make that decision whether or not to start me."

The lopsided loss gave Shue a chance to experiment after Denver wrapped up the game in the second half.

He took a long look at guard Lancaster Gordon, who made his season debut after undergoing knee surgery last summer. Gordon played 11 minutes in the second half. He hit his first shot and wound up with 4 points, 2 blocked shots, 1 rebound and 1 assist.

The Clippers trailed, 62-55, at halftime, but were blown away in the third quarter, 34-22 as Denver took command of the game.

Clipper Notes

Clipper Coach Gene Shue is one loss away from becoming the first coach in National Basketball Assn. history to lose 800 games. He has a career record of 767 wins and 799 losses in 21 seasons. Shue will probably reach the milestone Thurs tday when the Clippers play their next game against the Lakers at the Sports Arena. Shue would rather remember the wins than the losses. "What do I care?" Shue said when asked how it feels to approach loss No. 800. . . . Denver guard Lafayette Lever, who leads the NBA with six triple-doubles, just missed getting one against the Clippers, falling one assist short.

Los Angeles Times Articles


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Westwood Project : Tower Work Start to Cap 10-Year Struggle

February 07, 1988|LEON WHITESON | Leon Whiteson is a Los Angeles-based design writer. and

The Feb. 16 ground-breaking ceremony for Center West, a 22-story office tower including a three-story base with ground-floor retail space, at the northeast corner of Wilshire Boulevard at Glendon Avenue, will end a decade of struggle for Brentwood-based developer Kambiz Hekmat.

"I bought the site 10 years ago," Hekmat said. "Since then I've had to battle local homeowners, an ambiguous city councilman and a host of architectural preservationists to achieve what I believe will be a cultural contribution to Westwood as well as a superior business address."

Hekmat had to battle preservationists to achieve the September, 1984, demolition of the beloved 1950s Ships coffee shop that occupied the prominent corner site.

Designed by Martin Stern, the Westwood Ships was recognized by architectural historians and local residents as a masterpiece of the flamboyant "Googie"-style design.

Googie architecture has only recently been recognized as characteristic of an expression of Angeleno energy in an expansive period of the city's evolution.

The $39.5-million Center West, designed by New York-based architect Romaldo Guirgola in conjunction with executive architects Daniel, Mann, Johnson, & Mendenhall (DMJM), features a red Karelia granite tower that turns its main face to Wilshire Boulevard, coupled with a retail podium oriented toward Lindbrook Drive and Westwood Village to the north.

"This configuration derives from the site's peculiar double zoning," explained planning consultant Edgardo Contini. "The front half of the site, on Wilshire, has a permitted floor area ratio (to lot area) of 10-to-1, while the rear is rated at 3-to-1.

"The basic design problem was how to reconcile these two zones without producing an obviously schizophrenic complex."

At expected completion in mid-1989, Center West will total 296,000 square feet, with typical office floors of 16,500 square feet. Entry to the partially above-ground parking garage is mainly from Lindbrook, with a VIP auto access directly off Wilshire.

Design Winner

Guirgola won the Center West commission as result of a limited design competition held in 1982. A field of eight architects was narrowed to three: Guirgola, Cesar Pelli and Harry Weese & Associates of Chicago.

Originally, Guirgola's design solved the schizophrenic character of the zoning patterns by separating the tower from the base.

The main entry to the complex was located at the Wilshire-Glendon intersection, and a secondary entrance to the retail sector was set on the corner of Glendon and Lindbrook. An internal court gave access both to the office tower and to a skylighted mall lined with shops and restaurants.

The current plan moves the main entry onto Wilshire and fuses the base of the tower with the retail podium and the parking structure.

Gateway to Westwood

Hekmat said Center West, along with the recently announced Armand Hammer art museum planned directly across Wilshire, "will create an eastern gateway to Westwood."

The height and density-limiting Westwood Village Specific Plan, scheduled to be voted on by the City Council this week, will make it unlikely that Center West's gateway prominence would be challenged by further high-rises on Wilshire Boulevard.

Parking Foyer

Hekmat, who has not sought a major tenant for Center West, envisages the office tower's future occupants as "a mix of show business and other professionals, renting spaces that vary in size from a few thousand square feet upward."

Contini gave particular consideration to the integration of the parking circulation patterns, with the access to the office tower main lobby. A feature of the design is a three-story, semi-underground parking foyer with large windows on the street. Office workers and visitors enter this foyer directly from the five parking levels, and then make their way to the ground-floor lobby and its main elevator banks.

"In most L.A. office buildings the main street entry is more symbolic than functional," Contini said. "Most people enter by car, into what are usually dismal subterranean caverns stinking of gas fumes. In Center West we have tried to make this daily experience of arrival and departure more pleasant by recognizing this obvious fact of Angeleno life."

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Judge who halted California executions gets post in Washington

U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel will head the Federal Judicial Center. It's unclear whether he will retain the contentious case of death row inmate Michael A. Morales.

July 02, 2011|By Carol J. Williams, Los Angeles Times

The federal judge who five years ago halted executions in California is leaving the San Jose bench, the state — and most likely a contentious death penalty case — for a new job in Washington.

U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel on Friday was named to direct the Federal Judicial Center and will be moving to the nation's capital in October, long before any resolution in the protracted legal challenge to lethal injection can be expected.

Fogel said he has neither ruled out taking the case with him to the largely academic post as center director, nor determined whether that is an option under the judiciary's rules. But Fogel noted that the court record in the lethal injection case brought by death row inmate Michael A. Morales is "voluminous" and would be a time-consuming task for another judge to take over.

Whether Fogel's departure portends further delay in the case if it gets assigned elsewhere in the Northern District of California was unclear, legal experts said.

"Usually reassignments are made by the chief judge and the district clerk in consultation, but this is such a big case and Judge Fogel's got so much invested in it in terms of expertise, I don't know," said Carl Tobias, a University of Richmond law professor who follows the federal judiciary.

Executions have been on hold in California since Fogel stepped in on the eve of Morales' February 2006 lethal injection date to weigh whether the condemned man's arguments that poor training and cramped conditions at the San Quentin death chamber had exposed previous condemned men to pain amounting to cruel and unusual punishment. After evidentiary hearings, including inspection of the death chamber, Fogel ruled 10 months later that the state procedures needed reform.

New procedures were drafted by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation over the next three years, and the state adopted them nearly a year ago and presented them to Fogel for review. A month later, the state attempted to schedule the execution of convicted rapist and murderer Albert Greenwood Brown, which Fogel rejected as his judgment on the new protocols was still pending.

Efforts by the state to resume executions were further hampered in March when the corrections department and the attorney general requested a delay until next year to allow the new warden at San Quentin to put together another execution team. California has 714 death row prisoners, although only seven have exhausted their appeals.

With no activity in the Morales case expected until at least January, Fogel seemed to be weighing whether he could manage holding on to it while getting up to speed at the judicial center.

"It depends on what the rules are that govern this, whether there is an absolute requirement that judges give up their entire caseload or if there are exceptions," said Fogel. "If there are exceptions, then it's really up to me. But I'm just getting a handle on how much the demands of my new job are going to affect it."

Fogel, 61, said he was inspired to leave the Bay Area, where he has lived and worked for 37 years, for "a big urban city and all that implies" to become the judicial center's director for the next four to seven years.

"It's a chance to synthesize what I've learned and a chance to do some big-picture thinking, to think about the judiciary as an institution and what it means," said Fogel, who graduated from Stanford University before getting his law degree at Harvard Law School. "I've been a judge for 30 years, and this is an opportunity that rarely comes along."

Appointed to the federal bench by President Clinton in 1998, Fogel would retain his status as a federal judge while heading the judicial center. He said he hoped to return to a federal courtroom after his Washington stint.

Los Angeles Times Articles


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Outdoor Pollution

Story at-a-glance -

  • More than 18 million Americans may be consuming water with excess levels of lead
  • North Carolina’s concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) generate 15,000 Olympic pools’ worth of waste each year, contaminating both air and water
  • An International Energy Agency (IEA) report revealed 6.5 people die prematurely from indoor and outdoor air pollution worldwide each year

By Dr. Mercola

We all depend on access to clean water and air to survive, so when these very basic necessities are no longer pure, it represents one of the gravest threats imaginable to the future of the planet and its inhabitants.

Becoming aware of the problem is the first step to protecting yourself and your family. Unfortunately, having clean water and air is more the exception than the norm in the 21st century.

If you simply assume yours is fine, you could be risking exposure to pollutants that harm your health in the immediacy and down the road.

It's going to take change on a global scale — to industry, agriculture and public policy — to stop the water and air pollution that's already taking a health and environmental toll, but you can also act on an individual level to help the problem and protect yourself.

Lead Lurking in Water Systems Across the U.S.

The lead tragedy in Flint, Michigan, brought this toxic metal to the forefront of Americans' minds. Unfortunately, for many in Flint it's already too late. Today we know that just a tiny amount of lead dust can cause IQ loss, behavioral problems and hearing loss in children. Often, the damage is permanent.

Exposure to larger amounts (that are still small relatively speaking) can cause coma, convulsions and death. Tragic as the Flint catastrophe is, it is, sadly, not an isolated event.

Children in other states, from New York to Pennsylvania to Illinois, are also at risk of lead poisoning, some even more so than the children in Flint. Many are simply unaware there's a problem with their water.

A new analysis by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) even revealed that more than 18 million Americans may be consuming water from systems with lead violations in 2015.1

The report revealed more than 5,300 community water systems with violations to the federal Lead and Copper Rule (LCR). Such violations include failure to:2

  • Treat to reduce lead levels
  • Monitor for lead
  • Report rest results to citizens or the government

Millions of Americans May Be Drinking Water That Comes From Lead Service Lines

According to the NRDC, anywhere from 15 million to 22 million Americans receive drinking water that comes through lead service lines that may release the toxic metal into the water.

Only 3 percent of the communities with noted lead violations were penalized by their respective states or the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Many cities are even known to try and "game" the system by monitoring locations where lead is less likely to be a problem or use sampling methods that minimize the chances of finding lead.

"After years of complaints about these questionable techniques, the EPA finally issued a 'guidance' document at the end of February 2016 discouraging these methods, but untold numbers of cities have long used them," according to NRDC. Erik Olson, health program director at NRDC, continued:3

"Americans take it for granted that the water flowing from their home taps is clean and safe, but all too often that assumption is wrong.

Shoddy data collection, lax enforcement of the law and cities gaming the system have created a potent brew of lead violations and unsafe drinking water from the water supplies used by millions of people across the nation.

… And Flint doesn't even show up as having violations for lead in the EPA's drinking water tracking data, suggesting that millions more Americans could be at risk of drinking unsafe water but they aren't even being tracked."

Residents Not Warned of Toxic Fluoride Levels in Texas Water

In Texas, meanwhile, state regulators failed to warn residents about high levels of naturally occurring fluoride, which is a violation of the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA).

A five-month investigation by the Fluoride Action Network (FAN) revealed the violations, which they said, "resulted from systematic failures at the local, state and federal levels, placing Texas children at risk for disfiguring dental fluorosis and other potential harms."4

High levels of fluoride are so common in Texas that dental fluorosis, a condition referring to changes in the appearance of tooth enamel caused by long-term ingestion of fluoride, is known as "Texas teeth."

Fluorosis can lead to crumbling of tooth enamel in its advanced stages and consuming excess fluoride is also linked to learning problems, thyroid disease and bone problems.

The EPA requires water systems with more than 2 milligrams per liter of fluoride to warn residents that children under age 9 should not drink the water. However, according to FAN's investigation, officials with Texas water systems failed to provide such warning even when fluoride levels were in violation.

In response to FAN's investigation, local and state officials reportedly have taken steps to remind water system officials of the warning requirement. However, it's one more example of the toxins that may be lurking in your water, perhaps known to your local water system, but not known to you.

DuPont Poisons Water Supply, Sends News Releases Saying the Water's Fine

More than 3,500 lawsuits filed against DuPont in relation to the company's dumping of PFOA (perfluorooctanoic acid, also called C8), into the Ohio River. PFOA was an essential ingredient in DuPont's non-stick cookware for decades.

A decade ago, the EPA fined DuPont $16.5 million for withholding decades' worth of information about health hazards associated with PFOA.

In 2005, a scientific panel was ordered as part of a settlement to determine the chemical's effects on people. After seven years of research, the panel linked PFOA to ulcerative colitis, imbalanced cholesterol,5 pregnancy-induced hypertension, thyroid disease, testicular cancer and kidney cancer.

In DuPont's case, they had animal evidence of harm — from liver toxicity and kidney damage to death — for decades, but the company did not alert regulators of a potential problem.

Then there were the company's workers, some of whom gave birth to babies with birth defects after working in the company's PFOA division. DuPont knew of the problems and was tracking its workers for such health effects, but again failed to inform regulators of their findings.

Worse still, when 3M submitted a troublesome rat study to the EPA suggesting harm, DuPont told the EPA they believed the study was flawed.

While continuing to study the chemical's effects on its workers, DuPont was also tracking the chemical's spread into nearby waterways, as well as its emissions into the air through smokestacks.

At first, DuPont disposed of PFOA by dumping it in the ocean and later moved to disposing of it in unlined landfills and ponds. They knew the chemical was spreading widely into the environment and convened a meeting to discuss what to do about it but decided to keep using the chemical anyway.

David Freeman, of Washington County, Ohio, is at the heart of one of the 3,500 lawsuits against DuPont. He believes drinking PFOA-contaminated well water caused his testicular cancer.

At a hearing, DuPont's former head of the Community Responsible Care Team, testified that she sent press releases assuring residents that their local drinking water was safe.6 Even she had not been party to the many red flags DuPont was aware of showing, the chemical caused serious health and environmental harms.

15,000 Olympic Pools' Worth of Waste Every Year

This is the amount of waste that comes from North Carolina's concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) — the hog CAFOs alone, according to an analysis of maps and data of the state's CAFOs by the Environmental Working Group (EWG). According to EWG:7

"A new analysis by EWG and Waterkeeper Alliance shows that wet waste, primarily from pigs, in North Carolina's industrial agricultural operations produce almost 10 billion gallons of fecal waste yearly, enough to fill more than 15,000 Olympic-size swimming pools … Nestled near the Atlantic coast, these counties are beset with numerous air and water quality problems."

In addition, poultry operations in the state produce more than 2 million tons of dry animal waste, annually. The wet animal waste is often applied to croplands as "fertilizer" or dumped into waste lagoons. The open pits allow pathogenic microbes and chemicals to enter the air and waterways. Of the state's more than 4,100 waste pits, EWG found that:

  • 37 were located within one-half mile of a school
  • 288 within one-half mile of a church
  • 136 within one-half mile of a public water well
  • 170 within the state's 100-year floodplain

Air Pollution Causes 6.5 Million Deaths a Year Globally

An International Energy Agency (IEA) report revealed 6.5 million people die prematurely from indoor and outdoor air pollution worldwide each year.8 Deaths attributed to outdoor pollution, meanwhile, are expected to increase from about 3 million to 4.5 million by 2040 if no action is taken to curb it.

About 90 percent of the increase in outdoor-pollution-related deaths will occur in Asia, according to the report. IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol, Ph.D., stated, "Clean air is a basic human right that most of the world's population lacks … No country — rich or poor — can claim that the task of tackling air pollution is complete."9

Air pollution is so problematic that even snow is contaminated. When Canadian researchers collected snow from a park in Montreal and measured levels of toxic particles typically found in automobile exhaust, they found that snow appears to act as a sponge, soaking up multiple toxins from the air.10 Among them:

  • Benzene: a known human carcinogen that's also been linked to birth defects
  • Toluene: chronic exposure to toluene is linked to anemia, lowered blood cell count, liver or kidney damage, and may affect a developing fetus
  • Ethylbenzene: another known carcinogen
  • Xylenes: volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that affect the central nervous system, with symptoms such as headache, dizziness, nausea and vomiting

What Types of Health Problems Does Air Pollution Cause?

Outdoor air pollution is a serious environmental health risk linked to both chronic and acute health conditions, including stroke, heart disease, lung cancer, asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and respiratory infections.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the majority of premature deaths due to outdoor air pollution are due to heart disease and strokes.11 Particulate matter is air pollution made up of extremely small particles or liquid droplets. Typically, it's composed of any number of toxins, including organic chemicals, metals, soil or dust.

The smaller the diameter of the particle, the greater its risk of health damage becomes, as these can easily pass into your lungs. "Fine" particulate matter is generally defined as particles that are 2.5 micrometers or less. These particles may come from smoke (such as forest fires) as well as gases emitted from power plants, industrial activities and automobiles.

For comparison, the EPA considers any particles that are 10 micrometers or less as a potential health concern.12 If you happen to live in a heavily polluted area, the best option is to move, but I realize that isn't always a practical option. If you can't move, pay attention to the Air Quality Index (AQI), released by the EPA to calculate five major air pollutants:

  • Ground-level ozone
  • Particulate matter
  • Carbon monoxide
  • Sulfur dioxide
  • Nitrogen dioxide

If the AQI in your area is high, it may be best to stay indoors as much as possible. At the very least, avoid exercising outdoors when air pollutants are high (such as during rush-hour traffic).

Houseplants to Ward Off Indoor Air Pollution

Levels of pollutants in your indoor air may be two to five times — and up to 100 times — higher than levels outdoors, according to the EPA. This is a serious concern, especially since most Americans spend up to 90 percent of their time indoors.13

The most effective way to improve your indoor air quality, for instance, is to control or eliminate as many sources of pollution as you can first, before using any type of air purifier. This includes accounting for mold, tobacco smoke, volatile organic compounds from paints, aerosol sprays and household cleaners, pesticides, phthalates from vinyl flooring and personal care products, pollutants from pressure-treated wood products, radon gas and more.

The next step to take is free — open some windows. Of course, this can only take you so far, but it's an important and simple step. Next, since it is impossible to eliminate all air contaminants, one of the best things you can do is incorporate a high-quality air purifier.

There are so many varieties of contaminants generated by today's toxic world that air purification manufacturers are in a constant race to keep up with them, so it pays to do your homework in selecting an air purifier that works best for your size home and needs.

Aside from using an air purification system, there are a number of other steps you can take to take charge of your air quality and greatly reduce the amount of air pollutants generated in your home, and this includes adding houseplants. Rodale Wellness compiled 20 houseplants that remove indoor toxins from your air.14 Add one or add them all — the more you add, the more air-purification benefits you can expect.

Aloe vera

Areca palm

Elephant ear philodendron

Lady palm

Bamboo or reed palm

Rubber plant

Dracaena "Janet Craig" (corn plant)

English ivy

Dwarf date palm

Boston fern

Peace lily

Golden pothos

Kimberley Queen fern

Florist's mums (chrysanthemum)

Gerbera daisy

Dragon tree

Red emerald philodendron

Parlor palm

Spider plant

Your Air and Water Are Probably Toxic

Considering the widespread contamination found in air and water around the globe, it's best to assume yours is less than pure and take steps to remedy it. In addition to an air purification system, as discussed above, I recommend using a high-quality water filtration system (unless you can verify the purity of your water).

If you have well water, it would be prudent to have your water tested for arsenic and other contaminants. If you have public water, you can get local drinking water quality reports from the EPA. To be certain you're getting the purest water you can, filter the water both at the point of entry and at the point of use. This means filtering all the water that comes into the house, and then filtering again at the kitchen sink and shower.

Unfiltered water can also expose you to dangerous chlorine vapors and chloroform gas. The FDA and other U.S. government agencies report that most homes in the U.S. have measurable levels of chloroform gas, courtesy of chlorinated tap water.

Unless you have a whole house water filter, chlorine will vaporize from every toilet bowl in your home and every time you wash your clothes, dishes or take a shower or bath. Chloroform gas, chlorine vapors and the associated DBPs may increase your risk of asthma, airway inflammation and respiratory allergies. Chloroform gas alone can cause dizziness, nausea and general fatigue.

If you get your water from a municipal water supply and don't have a whole house filter, it really is important to open up windows on opposing sides of your home so you get cross ventilation. Keep the windows open for five to 10 minutes a day to remove these gases. Ideally, use a whole house filtration system.

One of the best I've found so far is the Pure & Clear Whole House Water Filtration System, which uses a three-stage filtration process — a micron sediment pre-filter, a Kinetic Degradation Fluxion (KDF) water filter and a high-grade carbon water filter — to filter out chlorine, disinfection byproducts (DBPs) and other contaminants. You can find more information about water filters in my video below.

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Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Deer Collage

I tried something new...collage is very popular these days, and I love the inventiveness of it!  I took a small sketch I had done of a deer and combined it with some thin rice paper (used I think for Chinese New Year - to burn for good luck?) and a few pressed leaves.  I liked the effect of it, though it turned out to not be sturdy enough to last through transportation, even under glass.  Lesson learned.

Anonymous said...

I have tried doing collage as well, and discovered that using the right glue has everything to do with the success of the piece. I have used Elmer's to Gorilla Glue. Does anyonoe find a glue that works really well with different surfaces?

Rose Altom said...

I find that Tacky Glue works well with just paper collages, but have had trouble with it when adding metal (such as a coin or jewelry)


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Arts-Louisville Reviews
News, Reviews and Interviews

Performing Arts

May 21, 2016

Enter Richard

Henry VI, Part 3

By William Shakespeare
Directed by Neill Robertson

Review by Keith Waits

Entire contents copyright © 2016 Keith Waits. All rights reserved.

Although it is filled with plenty of sound, fury, and violence, Neill Robertson’s staging of Henry VI, Part 3 finds its finer qualities in the quiet moments. This production at Walden Theatre/ Blue Apple Players finishes out the 2016 Young American Shakespeare Festival and productions of all three of the Henry VI trilogy.

As Part 3 opens, Richard Plantagenet, Duke of York (Alontay Maddox), has claimed the throne and Henry (Zoe Greenwald) has fled with his wife, Margaret of Anjou (Bailey Lomax) and young son Edward (Natalie Koch). Overwhelmed by all of the bloodshed, Henry is losing his grip on sanity, so his Queen leads his armies in the struggle with the House of York, taking back the crown and losing it again. Whatever its basis in history, this chapter in the War of the Roses offers one too many exchanges of power for my taste, but it balances the back and forth with humor, humanity, and a potent dose of villainy.

The villainy, and no small portion of the laughs, comes from the rise of Richard, Duke of Gloucester, the misshapen figure destined to be the infamous Richard III. Will DeVary attacks the role with relish, and director Robertson does something intriguing by guiding the performance into a deliberate overemphasis on the cliché of the twisted body expressing the twisted soul. Yet, in two moments where Richard is entirely alone onstage, with no “audience”, the physical deformities become much less pronounced, indicating that the cliché is itself a performance, and that Richard is most certainly playing the long game.

This production has many such touches, as when Edward, Richard’s brother, has supplanted the Duke of York. Robertson has York walk across the stage, with deliberate pace, until he is eyeball-to-eyeball with Edward, his lines spoken in a hushed whisper barely audible to the audience. It pulled us to the edge of our seats and drew us into the conflict between House Lancaster and House York on a much more personal level.

Robertson draws strong, insightful work from most of his principals. Besides DeVary’s risk-taking and forceful turn as Richard, Rebecca Willenbrink makes for a complex and compelling Edward, and Anne Shook brings her customary authority and intelligence to Earl of Warwick, managing the sense of the character’s shifts in allegiance with clarity. Frances Rippy also shows smarts and the strain of independence that marks Lady Elizabeth Grey, who Edward chooses for his Queen, a bright and lively talent making the most of a smaller role.

On the Lancaster side, Zoe Greenwald elicits sympathy for a Henry VI lost in the fog, an innocent struggling to comprehend the machinations of those around him. When, after one of the many twists in the plot, Edward and his cohorts set him upon, Henry wastes not a moment in offering up the crown, and Greenwald invests the gesture with a heartbreaking mix of eagerness and desperation. Bailey Lomax plays Margaret with the tenacity of a warrior and a politician, making no bones about wearing the armor and leading men into battle. There may not be lot of subtlety in Lomax’s performance, but there is plenty of steel.

After intermission, the play loses momentum slightly while some of the humor seems to let the air out of the balloon a bit, dissipating the tension that had kept the first half tight as a drum. In truth, much of the comedic “business” in this stretch seemed forced and distracting. But some brief combat sequences and the ruthlessness of Richard kick things back on track so that the play ends by finally resolving Henry’s fate, while also making us desirous to move right on to Richard III. With DeVary still only a sophomore, perhaps a new production of that history in about two seasons would bring him back to the role?

All three productions have used the dynamic opposing edifices separated by a chessboard stage designed by Clay Marshall and Eliot Cornett, and Lindsay Chamberlin’s costumes established their own identity while functioning within an overall design concept that applied to all of the plays.

Mr. Robertson uses more music than usual. Lifting liberally from film scores to underscore his cinematic staging. A few cues were distracting, but mostly it works well to reinforce tone and atmosphere.

This Henry VI, Part 3 is executed with great clarity and intention, and I was never for a moment lost or in need of a synopsis. It is perhaps helpful that this chapter is mostly all climaxes, having left the bulk of the set-up in the first two sagas. Action and turnabout of fortunes abound, and the bloody, bloody War of the Roses comes to an end. Or does it?

In this age of binge-watching entire television seasons on a single day, Walden/Blue Apple, newly christened as The Commonwealth Theatre Center, will offer all three Henry’s in sequence this Sunday, May 22, beginning at 12:30pm, ending the Young American Shakespeare Festival and the 2015-16 season.

Henry VI, Part 3

Part of the Young American Shakespeare Festival

Henry VI, Part 1         Henry VI, Part 2         Henry VI, Part 3

May 12 @ 7:30           May 13 @ 7:30           May 14 @ 2:00
May 14 @ 7:30           May 15 @ 2:00           May 15 @ 7:30
May 17 @ 7:30           May 18 @ 7:30           May 19 @ 7:30
May 21 @ 7:30           May 21 @ 2:00           May 20 @ 7:30
May 22 @ 12:30         May 22 @ 4:00           May 22 @ 8:00

Tickets – Evenings:
$15 adult, $10 student/senior

Matinees (Saturdays and Sundays):
$10 adult, $8 student/senior

Nancy Niles Sexton Stage
Walden Theatre/Blue Apple Players
1123 Payne Street
Louisville, KY 40204

KeithKeith Waits is a native of Louisville who works at Louisville Visual Art during the days, including being the host of PUBLIC on ARTxFM/WXOX-LP, but spends most of his evenings indulging his taste for theatre, music and visual arts. His work has appeared in Pure Uncut Candy, TheatreLouisville, and Louisville Mojo. He is now Managing Editor for

Fifth Third Bank Kentucky One Health Hilliard Lyons Brown Forman Aesthetics in Jewelry Louisville Marriott


WARC-Truncated: length

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Tourism PEIContactFrançais

Eptek Art & Culture Centre
130 Heather Moyse Drive, Summerside, PE  C1N 5Y8

One of seven PEI Museum sites, Eptek Centre offers a diverse array of exhibits and programs featuring heritage, visual arts and crafts. Exhibits of local and national interest provide glimpses into the rich PEI culture that Islanders and visitors are sure to find rewarding. Call or email for details on exhibits.

Phone: 902-888-8373

Year Round
Jul-Aug: Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun 12pm-5pm
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Friday, February 26, 2010

On Poetry and Politics

The finals of the 2010 Vermont Poetry Out Loud (POL) recital competition is this Saturday (March 6). With more than 30 schools participating we've had to change our format and add a semifinal round prior to the final round. It should be an incredible day up at the College of Fine Arts in Montpelier.

With the growing popularity of song and dance competition shows on television, Poetry Out Loud may be the closest many Vermont students get to tasting the the nervous energy (call it stage fright) that these shows are so good at turning into high drama (okay, "low drama"). Poetry Out Loud is a competition, with real benefits to the winners, and a great educational outcome for all who participate. And for family members who comprise most of the audience, it's pure theater.

In addition to a cash prize for him/herself and school, the winner of will attend the POL finals in Washington DC under the auspices of the National Endowment for the Arts and the Poetry Foundation. It's like the Scripps-Howard Spelling Bee, only more lyrical. But before the Vermont winner goes to Washington DC in late April, he/she has an earlier commitment... our Annual Arts Advocacy Day on March 17th in Montpelier!

Advocacy is a tricky thing when times are as difficult as they are now. Much of my time is spent talking with (your) legislators about the arts in ways that are by now familiar to everyone who reads this blog.

But here's the real truth...

No one in Montpelier can talk to your legislators the way you can. You are the one with the meaningful story. You are the one with the child who had the incredible arts experience. You are the one who is the legislator's friend or the neighbor or relative. You are the one who presents local talent to the world for the first time, who entices visitors to spend time and money in your (legislators') community. You are the one composing the song, choreographing the dance, recreating the role, capturing the essence of the place in words or images or music in the district your legislators represent.

Your messages have far more meaning than mine because, frankly, yours is the vote that counts.

So, what is your story, and when was the last time you told it?

Talking to your legislators while they are home during the Town Meeting Day break is important. But please come to Montpelier as well--for three reasons that I can think of. A lot of people from all over the state come together in Montpelier, and it's a real morale-booster to see that you are not alone. We all learn from each other, and there are several dozen people who will listen to your pitch and help you refine it. And finally, your legislators will not only see that YOU think its important enough to make the trip, they will see other legislators getting the same treatment. It makes quite an impact.

So please come to Montpelier on the 17th. Let your legislators know you're coming (click HERE for their contact information), and stay to hear a poetry recitation from this year's state POL champ. It will be well worth the visit!

Monday, February 15, 2010

Eat the Peanut Butter!

We are receiving reports from various arts supporters that legislators and newspapers have received letters that target the Vermont Arts Council and a few other small agencies for elimination.

I have read a few of these letters and their basic argument is that, as with household budgets when there is less money available, Government should cut programs (like the Arts Council) until it is operating within its means.

To me this sounds like a contestant on The Biggest Loser being told to eliminate the tablespoon of peanut-butter from his diet instead of addressing his 10-chili-cheese-dog-a-day habit because the peanut butter has, pound for pound, more calories.

Eliminating the peanut butter will, like cutting the Arts Council budget, result in two sure things: the problem won't go away, and worse, without it we will suffer from the lack of some crucial nutrients which our bodies and our society can ill-afford to be without.

The Government is not the same as a Household

The basic flaw with the letters I have read is the assumption that Government functions like a household. Government is supposed to protect its interests and the citizenry (sometimes even from the citizenry itself!), negotiate with foreign countries on behalf of the people, and provide programs and services that are in the people's interest but for which there is no market incentive for investment (like schools and health-care, and teacher's and veteran's retirement programs, all of which are topics that are too big to discuss here!).

A head of household, however, tends to preserve and protect what is dear to him/her, even if it is at the expense of a neighbor or the community-at-large. Nowhere is this behavior more pronounced, its effects more devastatingly felt, than when people charged with acting in the public trust behave instead like individuals bent on preserving and protecting "what's theirs." This is essentially what happened in Washington and on Wall Street during the past five or six years during which regulations were either gutted or ignored. Speculators created high risk/high reward instruments that created fortunes for themselves overnight, and when everything went sour, turned to the Federal Government for a bail-out. So-called public servants protected their own assets at the expense of everyone else.

So here we sit in a recession/depression with private capital more or less dried up, unemployment at a 25-year high, and private enterprise at best, in a state of paralysis. It is very tempting to cut Government spending until we have once again reached the point where our revenue equals or exceeds our expenses; where our annual deficit disappears; where are accumulated national debt starts to decrease.

The problem is that if the Government does this, then unemployment will get much worse and inflation will skyrocket because there are fewer goods and services being produced. Depression in every possible meaning of the world will be the status quo on a scale not seen before...

It seems counter-intuitive to individuals dealing with their own household budgets to say that the best possible way to improve things is for the Government to spend more, but Government is the only player right now who has access to capital.

Government must invest borrowed capital in order to invest in private enterprise to create jobs and restore consumer and market confidence. It is these jobs, these industries that receive this investment that will, eventually, and not without great anxiety, allow us to move towards a recovery.

Arts=Jobs; Arts = Community

State Arts Agencies not only recognize and support vital cultural institutions and artist projects, we partner with a variety of private and public partners to showcase various attractions and festivals that cause huge numbers of visitors and entrepreneurs to come to our state. These visitors spend enormous sums in our shops, restaurants, and hotels. The entrepreneurs start businesses, employ people and contractors, and make positive demands on and contributions to our community's social fabric.

Arts agencies also serve as a catalyst that allows significant amounts of supplemental educational experiences to engage students in our schools, most of which is directly related to the schools' curriculum goals and all of which is directed towards specific performance goals for every student, not the least of which is developing skills for the 21st-century workforce that are highly prized--like collaborative decision-making, public speaking, and creative thinking.

The two most frequently cited reasons why a business chooses to locate in one community over another--all other factors like tax incentives and regulations being equal—are the quality of the schools and the quality of community life, both of which are highly dependent on a thriving arts sector.

Cutting Government’s small investment in the arts, far from improving our economic situation, will actually make if far worse. Not only will the cut place at risk 2000 jobs throughout the state, but the closing of perhaps dozens of our cultural institutions, and the drying up of arts education programs in our schools will make Vermont a significantly less attractive place for people to visit, to invest in new businesses, and to raise families.

So, please, don’t be fooled. Eat the peanut butter. It's good for you. The real threat is those chili-cheese-dogs.

Monday, February 1, 2010

100% Essential

We are lucky to have a President, a Congress, and in Vermont, a Governor and a State Legislature who generally agree that the arts matter. But one legacy of the "Culture Wars" is that many ill-informed media pundits continue to assert that the arts are a luxury. Now, with the economy in the shape it's in, I keep hearing that it is time for all "nonessential government expenditures" to be cut, including the arts.

Let's take a long look at why this would be a huge mistake.

On a macro level:
1) The arts are a huge part of our gross national product. Film, television, video games and music production are collectively considered one of the biggest sectors of our economy--certainly our biggest export. Imagine the artistic output that goes into a film like "Avatar." Now imagine that plot occurring on a planet that looked like the moon and not like the Amazon rainforest. Do you think Avatar would be the second best all-time ticket seller in the history of film? Not a chance.

Now ask yourself a simple question--where did all those artists and musicians and dancers and actors come from? Where were they trained? How did they learn to draw, to compose, to play, to develop plot lines, to use their imaginations to create whole universes outside our comprehension? If we turn off the spigot that fosters and encourages those artists during their childhood years, we will truly create a bleak future for ourselves.

2) The arts generate tourism. As far as I can tell, hardly anyone visited Bilbao, Spain until the Frank Gehry-designed Guggenheim opened in October of 1997. The same could be said of North Adams, Massachusetts. A depressed milltown opens up MassMOCA (Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art), and voila!--a tourism mecca is born. Mayor Rudy Giuliani of New York tried to cut all public funding for the arts in retaliation for a work put on display at the Brooklyn Museum that he found offensive. He changed his mind when he learned that the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the combined arts groups that comprise Lincoln Center alone generate more tax revenue for the city of New York than the combined professional sports teams operating out of Yankee and Shea stadiums, the Meadowlands, and Madison Square Garden.

On a micro level:
1) Artistic decisions--or aesthetic decisions if you prefer--govern our individual behaviors every day. From deciding what to wear, and what make, model, and color car to drive; to what makes us choose our favorite restaurants and stores, or our favorite neighborhoods when it's time to buy a house and raise our families, how something looks or sounds or complements our personal aesthetic is almost always what causes you to decide to buy or not buy. Who makes all this stuff? And why did you buy the blue sweater and not the green sweater? If life is all about function rather than form, then we would have all evolved to wear the same clothes, drive the same cars, and enjoy the same activities. But form matters, which means design matters, which means the arts matter.

2) The arts exist, in part, to improve the human condition. For many, this is achieved through an exploration of the emotional or psychological connections that art conveys to the viewer. But for others, this is achieved in very concrete terms--in communities that renovate a community performance space (Vergennes, Derby Line, White River Junction and others) which fosters other business to locate nearby; entices good teachers to apply for jobs at the local school; and to provide a sense of place--of community well-being.

Ask yourself, why do you live and work where you do? I remember once asking a friend in DC what it was like to live in Crystal City (a complex of apartment buildings adjacent to National Airport with all its amenities like shopping and dining built underground). As a DC bedroom community it was ideal. Convenient, easy access to everywhere by Metro, and completely weatherproof. The problem, she said, was that it had no soul. It was a man-made moonscape across the river from one of the country's most vibrant cities. If she could have afforded to, she would have moved to DC in a heartbeat.

Most people will agree that responding to Haiti's needs is an essential government expense. So is fixing our own infrastructure and our own economy. Our government needs to figure out how to fund job-creation, learn how to effectively deal with al-Qaeda, the Taliban and other extreme terrorist organizations without killing (and radicalizing) civilians. It needs to reorganize the delivery of affordable health care, and take care of its citizens who have the least capacity for caring for themselves. All of these are essential to restoring our government and our country to its position as a world leader.

Doing so, however, will take a lot of creative thought; a lot of anticipating the problems and rehearsing ways to get around them. It's going to take some creative vision to share what our world will look like after this exhausting and scary period is over. We're not going to do it by just listening to the economists and the militarists and the jihadists. We're going to have to listen the artists as well. They are the most creative problem-solvers and community builders among us.

So...essential? Absolutely! The arts matter now more than ever.


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25 suspects arrested during search operations in Karachi

KARACHI: At least 25 suspects were arrested during overnight search operations conducted by police and Rangers officials in the port city, ARY News reported on Monday.

Crackdown against militants and troublemakers continued late last night where police and Rangers personnel did door-to-door search operations in Patel Para and its adjoining neighbourhoods, apprehending five suspects.

Meanwhile, a group of police officers led by Superintendent of police (SP) Gulberg arrested at least 10 suspects after a raid in Bhangoria Goth and transferred them to their investigation units.

Similarly, another targeted operation was conducted in the environs of Pehalwan Goth in Karachi and arrested more seven suspects.

In the area of Gulistan-e-Johar, three suspects were also taken into custody by police officials from Hussain Hazara Goth during an overnight operation.

A joint grand operation against militants banned outfits and miscreants has been underway in Karachi since long led by the government of Sindh in a bid to improve deteriorating law and order situation in the city.

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Sunday, 9 October 2011

Foxy Knoxy or Inspector Clouseau?

The power of narrative in public opinion has been made very clear by the Knox trial, appeal and acquittal.

On the one hand, the prosecutors invited us to believe in Knox as a sexual predator whose over the top games ended in the death of her flat mate.

On the other hand, the defence put before us a story of police ineptitude, with evidence collected late and without sufficient care, calling into question the DNA samples that provided the link between Knox and the knife.

Which story we find more credible is likely to have a strong influence on how we interpret the evidence: was Knox callous or inconsolable when seen in her lover's arms soon after the body of her flatmate was found?  And so on.

What we tend to find is that once a preferred story is settled on by an individual (you or me) or a group (police, media...) all the evidence in the world can be interpreted to fit that story.

It is no coincidence that Knox's family hired a PR consultant to help them to present a different narrative to the world, particularly the press.  And it's interesting (though sad) to note that a neutral narrative (such as 'she didn't do it, we don't know much else') is much less appealing to the press either than  the Foxy Knoxy narrative, which is sufficiently salacious, or the police ineptitude narrative (particularly foreign police ineptitude!) which eventually won the day.

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Philippine Airlines Increases Its Presence at Clark Airport

Clark Airport -65 km north of Malaysia- is turning again for airlines into an alternative to heavily congested Manila Ninoy Aquino International Airport. Philippine Airlines (PAL) is now just adding three new domestic routes with the first Cebu flight last Monday out of Clark International Airport (CRK).

Ismael Augusto Gozon, PAL senior vice president for airline operations, during the launching ceremony held Monday at Clark Domestic Passenger Terminal, said that PAL will add three new routes, namely Davao, Puerto Princesa and Busuanga that will fly out of Clark.

“PAL is launching Clark to Davao on February 1, and Puerto Princesa and Busuanga service on March 26,” Gozon said to local media as he expressed optimism that PAL’s operations will continue to grow in the coming months.

Clark-Cebu is Philippine Airlines third route of the nation’s flag carrier and the fifth one in less than three months. The airline launched a daily route to Caticlan on December 16, 2016 as well as weekly services to Seoul-Incheon in South Korea on January 1 this year.

The Clark-Cebu plane departs from Clark every Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday while the Davao route is flown every Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. “PAL’s flight is a new route that is part of our ongoing expansion outside Manila and we will continue to develop new routes for Clark as well as a secondary hub of operations in Luzon,” Gozon said.

President and CEO of Clark International Airport Corporation (CIAC). Alexander Cauguiran, declared that PAL decision shows the need to ease congestion at Ninoy Aquino International Airport in Manila which already reached passenger capacity of 37 million last year. By comparison, Clark welcomed last year only 950,732 passengers, a growth of 9.5% over 2015. it is still 28% below the airport’s record of 2012 with 1.32 million passengers.

“Clark Airport offers convenience and comfort to passengers especially those coming from the provinces of the northern and Central Luzon,” Cauiguiran said.

“President Rodrigo Duterte’s directive is to develop Clark―the premier airport of the North,” Cauguiran added, citing CIAC’s vision that is aligned with Department of Transportation Secretary Arthur Tugade’s efforts to develop the Clark International Airport with the support of private proponent initiatives. An urgent task is to offer a direct rapid rail link from Manila to Clark, a project which has been evocated for decades but never started due to the lack of funds.

The government of Rodrigo Duterte announced last November to plan at least US$1 billion in contracts to build a new green city in Clark for business headquarter, a new international terminal for eight million passengers as the much expected high speed rail link to Manila city centre.

It would then make the airport a true alternative to NAIA in Manila. Currently travel time from Manila city to Clark can last up to two hours and a half because of heavy traffic jams on Manila tollroads.

(Source: PNA)

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