RANT: Medicine Bottles & Kids

WHY is it MY RESPONSIBILITY to struggle to get a bottle of aspirin open because some kid ate it and died?

Some ‘childproof’ containers are adult proof, too!  Vitamins, pain medication, household cleaners:  everything is sometimes so difficult to open you want to smash the container rather than have to try to get it open.

Back to the RESPONSIBILITY thing.  If YOU as a parent, leave the medicine or cleaning solutions where the kids can get at them – it is YOUR RESPONSIBILITY – not the manufacturer’s!!!!  The manufacturer did NOT come into your home and shove half a bottle of medicine down your kid’s throat!  YOU are the idiot!  YOU left it where the kid could get into it.  YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE!

When I was a kid everything was kept out of reach.  There were no ‘kid locks’ on the cabinets.  All medicines were kept where my sister and I could not get to them.  We were TAUGHT – ‘never take medicine unless Mom, Dad or Grandma gives it to you.’

Nobody wants to be inconvenienced!  Nobody wants to take ANY responsibility for anything. It’s ALWAYS someone else’s fault.

No, America – YOU are a bunch of IDIOTS!  Quit pointing your fingers at manufacturers, blaming them for what should be YOUR RESPONSIBILITY.  Whatever happened to ‘buyer beware?’  The legal system has turned it into ‘manufacturer beware’ because of the stupidity and irresponsibility of consumers.

We should go back to having lids on things that we can open and if your kid eats/drinks something – as the irresponsible parent – you should be fined or thrown in jail!

We Are All LAB RATS

YOU and I are lab rats.  Your KIDS are lab rats, too. Unless you grow and consume all your food yourself, YOU are held hostage by the food companies.

Think about it.  Everything thing you eat -  e v e n   those so-called ‘natural’ or ‘organic’ foods probably are tainted in some way with something.

I know too much.  I have my roots in the local food movement, but they stretch way back to the environmental movement.  What I do here, and on my website an other blogs, is try to EDUCATE.

For the most part, the average consumer has their head up their butt when it comes to food and the environment.  They think it’s not their problem, that it doesn’t concern them and that it doesn’t affect them.

Do you send your kids to public  school? Do they play sports?  Do they eat school food?  Do you take them to fast food joints?  What do you buy for them at the  grocery store? Do you eat in restaurants? What DO you eat when you eat? What DO you drink when you drink?

What about your home life?  What products do you buy:  laundry detergent, body care products, beauty products, perfumes, lotions, hair dye, nail polish?  What do you paint your walls with?  Where did you get your furniture? Do you use any bug killing preparations?  What about your lawn?  Do you have a lawn care service and do you KNOW what they put on your lawn?  Have you had a pest company assure you their ‘chemicals’ are safe around kids and pets?  Do you go to Lowe’s or Home Depot and buy lawn care products to keep the nasty bugs away?  Do your KIDS PLAY ON YOUR LAWN?

Where do YOU choose to shop?  Is Wally-World your best buddy because you have fallen victim and been brainwashed by their  ‘save money, live better’  catchphrase?

Big business, especially the likes of Wal-Mart, does NOT give a shit about you.  Look at the way they treat their own employees?  They’ve been convicted on a vast array of charges in recent years of labor violations.  Going waaaay back, and I have a copy of the article in my files here…. they even wanted to move a Native American cemetery because they wanted to build a store!  Do you think, in this day of corporate greed, that it’s gotten any better, that they’ve become a kinder, more gentler Wally?

There are numerous links detailing environmental disregard -and- total disregard for human life on this planet BY food companies and agricultural chemical companies.  You and I and this planet are being POISONED by thousands of chemicals a day because the likes of Monsanto and Bayer… those kindly aspirin people.

DO THE RESEARCH.  Do it for your kids, your friends, your family, your friends and if you care enough – our planet.

Want A Job? Move To India

A friend who has worked for Bank of America just learned her job will end on July 31st.  She has worked there 15 years through various name changes and takeovers/buyouts.

Her boss announced the jobs would be outsourced to India.  Isn’t that NICE!

I just found out (un-officially) that I will be out of a job on July 31st .. wow. My dept is the best in the country – we have come under goal for 18 months! Not one other dept can say that. The big honcho came in person to tell us. One of my co-workers called me and told me .. management has yet to call me. Our jobs are going to India.  India!?! Freakin’ India?? Bank of America just got more bailout money .. for what?! I want to know what the hell they are using that money for! To decorate another office?! I am writing every person I can find – this is so not right! I am literally shaking from anger ….

WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO?  Those of us who are out of work and those who have recently lost their jobs and those who will be losing their jobs…., where are the jobs for us?

I guess we have to move to India.

There aren’t enough burger joints for all of us to work in!  Time was, a game of kiss-ass would keep you a job.  That doesn’t work, not when daily announcements of losses and layoffs blankets the news.

In the movie, “SICKO”, there is an interesting note.  A person interviewed in France said, “Here in France the government is afraid of the people.  In the U.S. the people are afraid of the government.”

Maybe it’s TIME for another REVOLUTION!  Time to let government know that we WILL NOT TOLERATE OUR JOBS BEING SENT OVER SEAS.  Companies who do intend to send jobs to places like India should be fined heavily.  Not being in law or government, I’m not sure how this would work – but IT HAS TO STOP NOW.  If companies are losing money – it is because people are not buying because they have no jobs or are afraid that they are next!

The new administration  has a terribly difficult task ahead of it cleaning up the Bush era mess. I don’t envy President Obama because I truly believe he is on our side.  It’s the other clowns in government I worry about!

How Safe Is Your Food?

Until recently, most of us never gave a thought to what’s in our food.  We just went to the grocery store, picked up those little packages wrapped in plastic and went home.  Unbeknownst to us, we have been used as human guinea pigs for the last 50 years or so.

Our food is less nutritious because the soil has been stripped of vital minerals.  Since the advent of the chemical age, farmers rely less on traditional methods of crop rotation and more on chemical additives.  Soil has been so inundated with chemicals, and a vast array of them because companies like Monsanto have convinced growers that natural is not the way – but CHEMICALS are king!

There has also been a horrific rise in various diseases like cancer.  Why?  It is known that chemicals can disrupt the body’s production of hormones and throw the entire endocrine system into turmoil.  Cancer, it is found, feeds on certain things that are a big aspect of our modern diet.  Sugar, milk products, artificial sweeteners are a few items which have been documented to assist the spread of cancer.  Diets consisting of processed food – food from a box or can, microwaveable or fast food -  instead of fresh food, are more likely to contribute to cancer growth.

Industrialized nations have a greater cancer risk.  Typically their diet consists of processed foods with artificial ingredients rather than fresh, natural food.

In the book, Foods to Fight Cancer, by Richard Believeau, Ph.D and Denis Gingras, Ph.D (DK Books 2007  ISBN# 978-0-7566-2867-3) a map showing global distribution of cancer tells all.  North American, Europe, Australia, Eastern Europe (Hungary & the Czech Republic) are colored bright red which means cancer is most prevalent.  The dark green areas:  western Africa, Southeast nations of India, Thailand and China have the lowest rates of cancer.

What’s in YOUR diet?

For more information, go to:  http://www.enviro-mentality-blog.com

or http://www.freewebs.com/thistledownefarmsveggievan

Disposable Workers

Have you heard this fairy tale?

A long, long time ago, in a far off land called the United States of America, people had jobs with companies who treated them like humans.  They could get a job and work there for the rest of their lives.  Unless they did something really bad, like steal or go to bed with the boss’ wife and get caught -  they could be assured this job for as long as they wanted it. All they had to do was show up every day and work as hard as they could.

Then one day, an ogre appeared.  It decided it was best for the company if it acted in its best interests.  Too bad about the employees, they’re just numbers on a time card, aren’t they?  They can’t have any feelings!

If the company could hire  new workers and pay them less, that would make it better for the business.  They found a lot of ways to get rid of the good, but over- paid workers and keep those out who wanted more than they were willing to pay.

It didn’t matter if the bosses made their jobs miserable.  If the workers quit, they could get NEW ones!  It didn’t matter if the good ones left.  They could get NEW ones and pay them less.

These big companies didn’t care if workers tried to have a life outside of the workplace.  It was too bad if the scheduling wasn’t feasible for the employee.  It doesn’t matter if there is nobody to take care of the kids because both parents have to work the same hours.  Surely you can pay for day care, can’t you?

We have a New idea:  let’s have the COMPUTER make up the schedules!  That way we won’t have to pay anyone to do it.  The computer can do it a lot faster.  It doesn’t matter if the computer has no knowledge of the employee’s situation.  Oh – an employee lives too far to work till after 11 and be back on the job at 6 in the morning?  Oh that’s silly – people can function of 2 hours of sleep and still be a courteous customer service associate, can’t they?  You love your job, don’t you?  You need your job, don’t you?

You have a medical condition,  &  yes, we see that you’ve brought a doctor’s letter with his recommendations.  Well, we’ll take care of that.  We’ll just interpret it to our benefit.  We’ll take every line, word for word and tell you what it really means.  If you don’t like it – there’s the door!

We’re going to save money on medical insurance.  We’ve decided that you have to work 40 hours to qualify – but – sssshhhhhhh, don’t tell anyone – we won’t hire anyone to work more than 35!  Now we can get out of paying 95% of our workers medical insurance!  After all, don’t we want to give our customers “low prices, always’ and continue ‘improving home improvement?’  After all, ‘you can do it, we can help,’  isn’t that right? We know our employees will say ‘I’m lovin’ it’ because we let them work here. We can’t let them ‘have it your way’, can we?

Your TOASTER Could Burn Your House Down!

First off, I would like to WARN everybody to UNPLUG household appliances that make heat. Toasters, toaster ovens, coffee makers, irons with automatic shut offs,  electric heaters, curling irons and hair dryers.

My toaster almost burned my house down!

It was the day after Christmas a few years ago.  I’d gone out for my usual morning walk at 6am.  When I got back it smelled like I’d left the coffee pot on and it was burning.  Going into the kitchen, the room was filled with smoke. I looked all around the room to see what was burning.  The last object I got to was the toaster.  The top was melted!

I ran over to see that the coils inside were RED.  The damn thing was ON, but I hadn’t used it in DAYS!  Yanking the cord out of the wall I chucked the blasted thing across the room!  Then I pitched it outside.

I was really shaken.  Since I was a kid I’ve always been afraid of fire.  The thing which scared me most was, had this been two days earlier (Christmas Eve)  I would have already been out the door to go to work! Being that my house sits way back from the road, it is very unlikely that my neighbors would have seen any fire in time to save the house.  All the cats inside would have died!

The toaster was made by Black and Decker.  It was only THREE MONTHS OLD.

The next day I e-mailed B&D to tell them that their toaster almost burned my house down.  At the same time I went on the Consumer Products Safety Commission website and  filled out a report because I wanted everyone to know about what had just happened.

I got a phone call from the CPSC the next day and was interviewed about the toaster.  They wanted it.  They were even willing to send someone to where I worked to get it.  SURE !!  Anything I could do to let the public know about something that was defective.  The appointment was set for Monday morning.

Meanwhile, Black and Decker e-mailed me and wanted the toaster.  I told them – NO WAY, JOSE…, because I was reporting this incident to the CPSC.  I bet they weren’t happy.

The man from the CPSC took a full report on the toaster:  It hasn’t been used in 5 days.  No, the cats hadn’t pushed the toast lever down.  It wasn’t knocked over; nothing fell on it.  I told him it was right where it always sat.  He asked to see the receipt and verified that it was 3 months old.  Then he wrote me a check for the amount I paid and also filled me in on some info that I want to impart to everyone:

Everything that has a switch in it has the potential to fail.  If the device makes heat this makes it even more dangerous. (this is one reason why I’ve never liked the idea of Crock Pots!)  When a switch fails there is nothing to keep it ‘off.’  It will turn itself on.  He advised me to unplug everything that makes heat when ‘on’: coffee makers, hair dryers, curling irons, irons,  all electric heaters, toaster ovens and especially toasters, when not in use.  He said that toasters had gotten better over the years but they still pose a hazard.

I was lucky.  There were 9 fires reported from these toasters.  The CPSC  issued a recall for all that model of Black and Decker toasters.  (They should stick to making hedge trimmers!) Consumer Reports also posted it under ‘recalls’ on their site.

If you have an instance like this - REPORT IT, don’t toss the appliance out thinking it doesn’t matter. YOU MAY SAVE SOMEONE’S LIFE.

Oh – a few weeks later, I got a check from Black and Decker.

They got off cheap: $14.95

A lawsuit would have been much more!

NOT Made In America

Corporate America has made our bed and now we have to sleep in it.

Our economy is bottoming out.  Our job base has eroded over the past 40 years.  What DO we make in America? If luck holds, we still might be able to get an American-made car and a few other things.

Go to any store.  Pick up an item from the shelves.  You probably won’t see “MADE IN USA” on the bottom of it. Why?

GREED

Corporate America decided long ago that it was in ITS best interests to sell things made overseas.  Instead of paying workers a decent wage and be restricted by labor laws, environmental restrictions, the IRS and consumer watchdog groups – CHINA became the new America.

Why NOT go overseas?  Why NOT outsource?  Where was the incentive to save U.S. jobs, and with it, the ecomony?

Companies can do what they please outside America.  The wage scale is so much lower.  They can pay people a fraction of what the pay is here, offer no costly items like insurance, not have to bother with labor laws.  Since there are little, if any, environmental regulations, they can run amok and pollute all they want.

Those who buy from overseas, like Wal-Mart, Lowe’s and others, get away cheap.  It’s better for their bottom line to buy stuff made in sweatshops by people being paid a pittance.  No attention is paid to the health or well being of these workers in countries like China, which as you know, has a  ‘fantastic’ (HA!) human rights record!

Outsourcing has become rampant.  Have to call for service on your Dell computer?  You’ll get somebody who barely speaks English with such an accent that you can hardly understand them.  Companies like IBM can pay an engineer in India $10,000 a year instead of a six figure salary, PLUS benefits, here in the U.S.

We may have done this to ourselves.  Unions, which were a fantastic idea at the turn of the last century, probably were part of the reason why companies left enmasse. Not having to pay high union wages and benefits, when given the chance, companies made a run for the door.

This government did NOTHING to stop these industries from leaving.  I’m not up on all this, but WHY was this allowed to happen?  We probably wouldn’t be in half the mess we are today if manufacturers hasn’t been allowed to abandon the American workers.

GREED, that’s what it is!

What to do?  I don’t know.  I’m no economist or banker, but I have a few ideas:

BUY LOCAL: from the Little Guy

EAT LOCAL and SEASONAL: Support your local small farmers instead of the agribusinesses. Do NOT buy food from foreign countries.  (see forthcoming FOOD BLOG)

SUPPORT EACH OTHER:  Get a community garden going.  Get to know and help your neighbors.  Barter!

We’re all in this economy mess together and we have to work together.  Now is NOT the time to be apart.  We can help each other.  You may be able to offer something to someone and they in turn, may be able to offer something of value to you.

It is tough right now but WE are AMERICANS and WE CAN MAKE IT THROUGH THIS – TOGETHER!

Rock ON!

Another Mr. Coffee Takes a Crap!

What IS it with ‘stuff’ these days?  Ah yes, manufacturers in cahoots with retailers have elevated planned obsolescence to an art.  They’ve got us in a trap.

I’m old enough to remember when things like toasters lasted 10, 15 or 20 years.  My sister used our childhood toaster, circa 1950′s, till one of her cats peed in it in the 80′s.  My favorite aunt still uses her wedding present toaster from 1953!

This is my fourth coffee maker in 10 years. I bought the first one in 1999 after moving to this house with only an SUV full of stuff, sans coffee maker.    It supposedly had an automatic shut off  after 2 hours.  One day not long after I bought it, I went out to the store, forgetting to turn it off, and came back about 4 hours later to find the pot still on and burning.  It went right into the trash!

The second one started peeing all over the counter.  I’d make coffee all right, but in the process it needed to be swaddled in diapers.  I still have the damn thing… for the life of me I don’t know why!

The third one I bought just up and died, less than a year after I bought it.  Now, it needs to be mentioned that I am not serving 100 cups a day out of these machines.  I make one pot a day.  Sometimes in the afternoon I’ll put on a pot.  In the rare occurrence that company shows up, I’ll make another pot.

The present one must be related to the second one because it seems to have a bladder problem of late. I’ve tried fooling with the little dohickey that closes off the flow of the coffee when you want to pour as it brews.  Cleaning it does no good because even tho the shut off thing works, it still pisses out the bottom.

I guess we have to buy the expensive $100 machines from kitchen stores and keep our fingers crossed that they don’t get incontinent or dementia!