Lighthill #29 - I vote in West Roxbury (MA), and even though I checked weeks in advance to make sure I was registered and ready to go at my current address, I turned up this morning to discover that the lists had me as "inactive."
It was irritating, not than catastrophic. I showed ID and was given a ballot. After I voted, I was asked to fill out an affidavit of continued residence AND a voter registration form, both of which I gave to the Warden. I was anxious and irritable about the situation (I am *not* an inactive voter, thankyouverymuch) but was reassured by the fact that they had me vote first and then do the other paperwork, so there wasn't any question of whether my vote would be counted.
It's not just Cambridge, though. At least it was a paper ballot.
Jim, #13:
In My Opinion, a first aid class designed for Average Guy/Gal on the Street should run 16+ hours and have a ton of hands-on.
God, I would have loved to have had permission to teach that class. I would have loved to have been trained to teach that class. ARC classes are (or were) generally 7-8 hours: 4 hours in the morning for CPR, 3-4 hours in the afternoon for First Aid, multiple choice test, boom, you're certified, we'll see you again next year for CPR and three years from now for First Aid. Happy Helping.
There was, at least, about as much hands-on as the time would allow. That was definitely the emphasis. But...it's not enough. It's flat-out not enough.
Interesting. As of 1999 (as in, things have presumably changed several times since then), when I was teaching first aid for the ARC, we were instructed to downplay or skip the splinting section of the manual and advise students only to splint if they believed they were going to have to move the patient before the ambulance arrived.
This didn't seem entirely satisfactory; I like skills, and the default assumption for all skills, as far as I'm concerned, is that they're not always appropriate to the occasion and one must assess. Unfortunately, the Red Cross isn't big on people who have just taken an afternoon's First Aid class making assessments or applying judgment - or wasn't when and where I was teaching.
::makes mental note to consider splinting a viable option, depending on circumstances::
The first "Our Bodies, Ourselves" contained instructions for using a
diaphragm as a menstrual cup, which was my first introduction to the
concept, but which indicates it's been around for a while. Even though
I turned out to be incompatible with them, I love the idea and always
beam with pleasure when I see a new brand name on the market.
As for variations, the Keeper had a 'no child has passed through
this cervix' style and an 'at least one child has passed through this
cervix' size/shape. (I forget how they phrased it, but that was the
gist.) I *think* the Diva cup does too. For more variation yet, one can
return to the diaphragm which (as I understand it) is individually
fitted. More expensive, but it's not like one needs dozens of them.
When I visited the Central African Republic (1990), in the capital (Bangui), one pretty much didn't want to be seen carrying a camera, and certainly not taking any pictures with it, or the gendarmes would take and smash it. (The gendarmes were young men who were given uniforms and guns, but no salaries; the only income they had was from fees/fines they could levy and bribes. There's a small problem in this plan.) When we went for an evening stroll along the river side, with my brother explaining all the reasons one did not swim in the water, e.g., giardia, crocodiles, etc., we approached a water tower and were angrily waved away and shouted at until we crossed to the other side of the road. A water tower is a government installation; they couldn't allow people who might be spies to get close enough to take a good look.
It was, at that time, one of the poorest countries in the world. I think the near-hysterical fear of spies was an important way of...feeling important.
Why this kind of thing is now common in some of the richest countries in the world is another question, of course.
It seems likely that all that will happen is that the high quality manufacturers selling their confections in the US will add something on the label saying that their chocolate is made with real cocoa butter and no other oils. I imagine they're already putting their copy-writers to work with their lawyers to figure out how to phrase it appealingly and within the law. ("We can't say that only chocolate made with only cocoa butter is 'real.' Can we say it's 'authentic'? We could say 'old-fashioned,' is that going to have the right appeal? How about--")
As an inveterate label-reader, I don't see the hardship, here. I suspect that within a few years, even the major manufacturers of cheap candy in the US (Hershy, Mars, Nestle, etc.) will have two versions of their most popular items out - a cheaper one made with substitutes, which people will buy for children, offices, and parties - and a more expensive one made using only cocoa-butter and no other oils for a smaller but significant market - in much the same way that the more expensive bars of chocolate made by Lindt, Ghirardelli, Cote Noir, Choco-Love (one of my favorites), and all the rest have a solid market, even though they're not replacing M&Ms in any kindergarden Hallowe'en party.
If you look, there are already cheap 'off-brand' products which have what's carefully called "chocolatey" chips or "chocolate-flavored coating," precisely because they're already using the vegetable oils.
I may be missing something, here, but it seems as though what we're looking at is an increase in cost rather than a drop in quality, for those who care to seek out what they want. That's annoying, but costs do rise, willy-nilly.
I will say, however, to anyone who thinks no one will notice the difference, that I think it's true that many people (I judge by my coworkers, alas) who eat the candy at room temperature or colder won't notice much or care at all. But anyone who cooks with the stuff is going to need to read labels carefully. I once tried to make a batch of truffles using what turned out to be "white confectioner's chips" rather than "white chocolate chips" and I will never forget the bizarre, plastic/elastic cohesive glob that formed in my saucepan to my stricken horror.
| Year | Number of comments posted |
|---|---|
| 2008 | 6 |
| 2007 | 1 |
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