LIVING WITH MCL

Now that John McCain, Lindsey Graham, Marco Rubio and a host of other Republican leaders are beating the drum to return the US war machine to Iraq, I think it is worthwhile pointing out one little known fact. .......we [the United States] spend more in six months in Iraq ($54 billion) than we spent in 30 years on the National Cancer Institute, which funds most cancer research. Today, only two in 10 grant proposals from qualified researchers are funded by the NCI, which means that plenty of possible cures die for lack of funding. That quote was made over 6 years ago by Hamilton Jordan shortly before he died of cancer in 2008, in an interview with Johnathan Alter . I only bring this up because I find it reassuring to know there are still members of Congress who won't rest on their laurels, nor compromise their principles one iota. They still place a higher priority on taking lives, than they do on saving them. Just my opinion of course.

I just need to do more. My life is becoming ever more mundane. Everyday is the same, and the effort needed just to get up and get going in the morning, seemingly gets more and more difficult. EVERY morning when I get up, the first thing I do is drink a 20 oz cup of green tea. I've been doing this for as long as I can remember. It wakes me up. It gets me moving. It keeps me alive. It's gotten to the point I almost feel I have to do it. But why does it have to be 20 oz? That's a lot of tea for one sitting. It's the equivalent of 2.5 - 8 oz cups, and it takes a relatively long while (45 minutes to an hour) to drink. Consequently, I have to get up earlier than I might otherwise, in order to allow for sufficient time before starting my day. Just think how much extra sleep I could get if I didn't drink such a large amount of tea. It's true I attribute drinking of green tea to my longevity in dealing with MCL (and something I have no intention of giving up), bu

While I could easily make that same claim for a number of other things, i.e. too much news channel, too much talk radio/TV, too much reality TV, even too much Golf Channel, I attribute the Food Channel to having a greater influence in changing my perception of food, than other programming has done in changing my perception of the world. There was a time when I equated the quality of a restaurant only by the quantity of food received (the more the better) and the price (the lower the better). Seldom, if ever, did I give taste or presentation a passing thought. But the Food Channel has changed that. No longer do I give quantity or price a high priority. Taste is the foremost requirement, with presentation being secondary. It's also the biggest reason I dislike going out to eat so much anymore. Although high quality restaurants abound, it seems most neighbor restaurants are of the low quality variety, i.e. lacking flavor and presentation. So I would rather stay home, open u