Living Life on Life's Terms

One step at a time, 14,000 times

2008-03-09T12:17:00.003-05:00

I ran today.

For people who know me as a runner that might solicit a reaction of "of course, that's what runners/triathletes do!" The rub is that I haven't run at all for several months as I have struggled with more fundamental tasks such as breathing and sleeping. I went out on a group run today with the Boston Triathlon Team and hung out for some socializing later. So, this was a significant event and it bears repeating.

I RAN TODAY!!!

One step at a time. I ran 14,000 steps (about seven miles) along the Charles River. Although it was much slower than usual and not as long as normal, it was amazing that I was able to do it and I feel so fortunate to have completed the run and to be part of supportive communities of athletes with both the Boston Triathlon Team and the Cambridge Sports Union (my running club).

I have never taken my running for granted. I have always rejoiced in every run I take, realizing what a gift it was to be able to be doing it. That appreciation and joy is on a whole new level now. I am moving forward with my life and am on a path towards complete recovery and towards continued improvement as an athlete.

I can accomplish much when I try to control little, all the while working hard.

It's so easy to take life for granted

2008-03-03T00:43:00.004-05:00

Nothing like not being able to breathe to put life into perspective.

I had a good life going and was on a path of continued improvement and happiness, or so I thought.
A variety of circumstances combined to cause a significant deterioration in my health. I thought it was rapid since I had a huge asthmatic attack in the middle of the night(first time ever for that type of thing) but I now think that it had been building-up over time. That was seriously scary. I'd never had trouble breathing before and here I was being awoken and not being able to get a breath. I thought I was going to die.

After the asthmatic attack, my health deteriorated quickly. I was soon waking-up 3 - 8 times per night for periods of 10 - 60 minutes each time. I was getting less-and-less sleep and I started getting sick frequently. I was sometimes too weak to go to work. Other times, I was disoriented and confused from the lack of sleep. Running and other exercise was out-of-the-question. I had to withdraw from being on the board of several nonprofits as I was barely able to function.

In just a few short months, my life had changed completely. I had lost most of the things that were important to me and that defined my life. I was miserable. I didn't know what was going on and neither did the doctors. They thought it was severe allergies but were puzzled by the extreme nature of the problem. They gave me more and more medications to deal with it but I experienced almost no relief.

It wasn't until I went to OHI that I began to experience significant relief. I know that they provide a unique, and cleansing, environment that probably helped me in multiple ways. I now think that much of my distress was caused when I stopped being vegan. I've now regained my wits and my internal compass so I'm going back to being vegan - more on that in another post though!

SNL parody on media's treatment of Obama and Clinton

2008-03-01T13:13:00.003-05:00

You Tube and NBC both removed this footage but the internet gives power to the people - kind of like democracy is supposed to!

My Oh My, OHI

2008-02-20T19:51:00.003-05:00

I recently spent two weeks at the Optimum Health Institute in San Diego in a quest to improve my mental, physical and spiritual health. It was a wonderful experience and I wrote a poem about it while I was there.

I came searching for help with a problem
and I found oh so much more

Although I had heard tell of what was done here
I had but an inkling of what lay in store

In just days a transformation began to take root
and hope sprouted from within me

I had arrived but a shell of my former self
and found help here, Yippee!!!

Here wheatgrass is Queen and it goes everywhere
sometimes an enema precedes it, but let's not go there

The people here; I love them!
What a grand lot

The classes were all awesome
even when I wasn't feeling so hot

Can't leave out exercise and stretch
for they helped build the new me

And let's not forget circle
where love and good vibes flow free

Yes, yes...the food. What can I say about that?
Let's say "I loved what it did for me." and we'll just leave it at that!

OHI gave me the space and tools to begin a transformation
I'm sad to be going but I'll leave you with this proclomation

Together we have change
Taken steps towards optimum health

Together we have done
What alone we could not

Let's do our best to take some OHI magic
And spread it from sea to shining sea

Through the power of example
We can show everyone how wonderful our lives can be!

"Dear Mr President" - a letter from a 4 year old

2007-10-13T10:56:00.000-05:00

The following letter to the President was dictated by my niece to her mom. It's amazing to see this combination of awareness and action in a child!

Dear Mr. President:

My name is Rachelle and I have a plan to save the
world from global warming. My plan is to stop driving cars, and stop using
water, people who are being violent should go to Montessori schools that only
allow nice people so they can learn how to be nice. And there should be more and
more markets around, and there should be parades that celebrate Presidents' Day.
And you should talk with all the other presidents about my questions and talk
about it with the people who come to hear what the president has to say. You
should stop using the stick pads for diapers - instead use safety pins. We
should put more schools instead of co-ops for little kids. And we should
celebrate for all my messages and I should get the biggest, fattest trophy in
the world. Thank you for receiving my message.

Bye Mr. President.
-Rachelle Evelyn Yombo
4 years old

We shall not regret the size of our email inbox nor wish to shut the door on it.

2007-08-15T20:56:00.001-05:00

I use Outlook at home and at work. At home I pull my 3 gmail accounts and my consciousconsuming.org email into Outlook. At work, I pull those same accounts into Outlook, which also handles my work email. This is very efficient - on the face of it. The reality is that, despite checking my email multiple times per day, I had over 2,500 emails in my work inbox and 1,500 emails in my home inbox. That doesn't count the many folders and subfolders with a few thousand more emails. That was 2 days ago.

I now have no email in my inbox at work or home and 3 folders in each account. I cleared them both in only 24 hours. It's a miracle. My email life is now so mangeable. I know a new freedom and a new happiness. I now intuitively know how to handle emails which used to baffle me. The empty inbox is not a theory.

Although I deleted most of the email that had just been sitting around, this is what I did with the rest.
Action Needed folder - these are emails that require less than 5 minutes of action and need to be responded to within the week.
Action Pending folder - these emails will need something in the near future but will require more information or a bigger chunk of time down the road.
Archives folder - email I want to save but don't have any plans for

I also set-up rules so that list serves, newsletters and other announcement emails go directly to archive but are automatically categorized with the apporopriate label(newsletter, list serve, etc) so that I can pull them up and read them in one structured piece of time.

It works, it really does.

Life is good. Email is manageable. Thanks 43 Folders!

Marty's Movie Madness

2007-08-14T00:05:00.000-05:00

Wednesday V for Vendetta*
Thursday Live Free or Die Hard
Friday The Simpsons
Saturday Bourne Identity**
Sunday Bourne Identity**
Monday Sicko
*own movie, viewed at home
**rental, viewed at home

I usually watch one movie per month in the theater and two a month at home so the last few days have been quite the movie-watching experience for me! I've mentioned V for Vendetta before, I blogged about it the night I saw it in the theater. It's a great movie and it inspires me everytime I watch it! Live Free or Die Hard is the fourth Die Hard movie and it was mediocre, or maybe decent - but not better. The Simpsons was classic Simpsons but could wait for video release. Bourne Identity is a good movie. I was watching it prior to viewing the 3rd Bourne movie in the theater(Bourne Ultimatum) but I haven't been able to rent the 2nd movie yet(Bourne Superemacy).

And then there's Sicko. I'm not a Michael Moore fan. Although I'm reasonably aligned with much of the content, I generally haven't cared for his delivery and some other aspects of many of his movies. Sicko is different. Sicko delivers solid information. Sicko doesn't hound people. Sicko sticks to the point(except for one out-of-place Iraq reference). Sicko is educational and provided me with a new perspective on our health care system in a similar way that The Corporation helped me better understand corporations. I highly recommend it.

One last thing.... my home movie system is great. I finally turned it up to movie-watching volume and got the surround settings adjusted. It brings movie watching to another level! It's not enough to keep me home but I anticipate watching a movie or two every week depending how busy I am.

So are you really reading this?

2007-07-28T16:32:00.001-05:00

I watched the Matrix again this week and it still resonates with me.

Everything that we see, touch, taste, hear, etc is actually sent to our brains via elecrical signals. Can those signals be replicated so that we can tell our brains we're doing one thing while we're actually dormant(a la The Matrix)? It certainly seems plausible. Are you really reading this or are signals being sent to your brain that make you think you are?

Are we here? Do we exist? Could the answer possibly be no?

I'm not here to offer answers to these questions. I'm merely stating that I find the questions to be interesting. Definitely good coffee shop conversation. (Why is it that some things are deemed good for discussing over coffee? But I digress - let's save that for another time).

I don't spend much time wondering about things. I could think myself out of action, and out of a life. I find it best to generally except some basiscs like our existence and reality being real. I save the majority of my questions for discussions of cultural norms, dominant paradigms and anythign regarding the peace and social justice movements.

No cute picture or words of wisdom today. I do still have gratitude, plenty of it. God is good. Life is good.

An attitude of gratitude

2007-07-26T20:40:00.001-05:00

It's easy to be happy when I have these guys in my life! Along with their parents and their grand-parents (my Mom and Dad), who are all in D.C., they are my family!

Although I went through that normal phase of being difficult to get along with, the length of time that I was in that phase was well beyond normal. I know that I am fortunate to have them in my life and I now look forward to seeing them. I still owe my niece a plate so I'm scared of her but I'm on good terms with the rest of them!

So any guesses on why Leo isn't smiling? I think it's because he got droopy cotton candy! It could be that he's practicing his "hard" look for when he goes to preschool in a couple of years.

Web 2.0 - directory assistance

2007-07-25T21:37:00.001-05:00

Wow, I remember getting Commodore Vic 20 in Junior High or High School and being excited. That computer wouldn't run a single application and certainly couldn't handle doing any websurfing but that was pre-internet so it was fine for what it was.

Now we have the World Wide Web. It's actually been around long enough that evolution has been decreed and we have Web 2.0.

Web 2.0 is the interactive web that encompasses Social Networking Sites, Wikis, Video Sites, Photo Sites and all similar types of sharing/interacting sites. It's fast, it's loose, it's unfiltered and self-published. It's the new frontier of the internet. It is continuing to expand and I'm only slightly tapped-in yet I'm way ahead of my peers.

Here are the few sites that I have registered with(maybe one tenth of the ones available):

Marty's on the web!

people search by

make your own Wink Widget!

The pictures inspired me

2007-07-18T20:09:00.000-05:00

Although I've been thinking of blogging quite often, I simply haven't. That goes for many things in my life. Blogging is certainly a lower priority but it is probably telling that I haven't blogged for so long.

Went camping this weekend. Took off Friday and drove up to the White Mountains(NH) with Dave. Got a site, went food shopping, mucked around, built a big fire, ate a big dinner and hung out. I wasn't staying in a tent since I had a cabana attachment for my new Element that I wanted to try. It said that it was not for use in the wind or rain so within two hours of setting it up we had a big rain storm complete with wind. It seemed to fair well. I went to bed before the other Dave arrived with Mike(around 11:30 p.m.).

We had a big campfire breakfast before heading over to a trailhead to do a hike. We had a good time hiking South Hancock. The original Dave and I hit the summit and then caught up with the other two who had not done the very challenging final 1/2 mile.

We then stopped for ice cream, went to the grocery store to buy stuff for dinner, stopped for ice cream again, bought 8 bundles of wood and headed back to the campground. We proceeded to build a cooking campfire and in addition to cooking fish, steak, sausages, asparagus and marshmallows, we also cooked a pizza.

We then built the fire up to a more respectable size and did the only sensible thing at that point...

After a leisurely morning and some quality time under the tarp during another rainstorm, we headed into town for some hanging-out before hitting the road.

A wonderful, exciting, refreshing and laughter-filled weekend!

What did I do to deserve this?

2007-04-30T22:19:00.000-05:00

Wow....sometimes I wonder - why me?

Why did I get to be born in one of the richest countries in the world?

Why did I get to be born with white and male privilege?

Why did I get to have well-educated parents who helped me and continue to do so even to this day?

Why did I get so many chances to get it right?

Why did I get to live through everything I did despite myself?

Why did my life get to be so good?

Why do I get to have all of my basic needs taken care of?

I don't know, but God does and that's all that matters.

I have a wonderful life. It's nothing like I would have ever imagined but it's my life and I love it just the way it is. Everday is a blessing and I've grown to appreciate that. Gratitude is an action word and I have to remember that!

Mission Accomplished

2007-04-27T22:10:00.000-05:00

Remember when that used to mean something positive? When Bush stood in front of the Mission Accomplished banner and declared that the war was pretty much over, he sunk to new depths. Of course, he was 1/2 right. The mission was accomplished, it's just that the war was hardly over.

We all see that now. This wasn't about Osama. Bush used to say that there would be no rest until Osama was found dead or alive. Now he doesn't care where he is. The Mission was to increase our occupation of the Middle East, secure control over additional oil supplies before China and Europe could and to advance the neocon agenda that had been outlined.

Yep, Mission Accomplished. Who's ready to stand up and sing "Proud to be an American" now?

Shame on Nancy Pelosi but the buck shouldn't stop there

2007-04-19T22:56:00.000-05:00

Thanks goodness for YouTube because I wouldn't have believed this if I hadn't seen it. Staffers at Nancy Pelosi's office having Tina Richards, the mother of a Marine, arrested. Her "crime" was protesting the fact that the media was being kicked-out of Pelosi's office.

Sure I blame Pelosi and her staffers but they're just the festering Republocrat wound that is oozing all over D.C. The real blame is with the voters.

If you're tired of the same old shit in this country stop voting for members of the ruling elite who are directly or indirectly beholden to the major corporations and lobbyists. On many key issues Gore = Bush = Clinton(either one) = Obama = Cheney = ... well you get the picture. If you think otherwise, enjoy the blue pill you took because that's not my reality.

Why not insist on a candidate who has ideals, isn't in anybody's pocket and will effect meaningful change? I that too Quixotic for you? Why can't we insist on that? The majority of the population wants change but thinks that the ideal candidates are too utopian or idealistic. Let's stop selling ourselves, our country and our future short and start voting in unison for real candidates. Let's not delude ourselves that the Deval Patricks and Hilary Clintons of the world are a real improvement.

Please look at Dennis Kucinich and be part of his million for 50 million campaign. http://kucinich.us/news

Oh yeah, and look at the Pelosi video as well:

Being a Man

2007-04-18T13:11:00.000-05:00

I have mixed feelings about this video but it generated some thought about being a man.

Why is it that I'm expected to have "watched the game," want to see an action flick, like to fix things, etc, etc? I could care less about watching sports, or TV in general for that matter. Although I do enjoy an occasional action flick, you'll find mainly documentaries in my library. As far as fixing things, building things, etc... let's not even go there.

I have a journal that I got at the Human Rights Campaign. The cover reads:

Just Because I'm a Guy doesn't mean I automatically know how to fix a car, or
light a campfire. Sometimes I do ask for directions when I'm lost and
contrary to popular belief, I don't always want to watch sports on TV.
Showing my sensitive side doesn't mean that I'm not a man.

That leads me to the next thing. Why is a common reaction to someone being different to call them a fag or a homo? A homosexual man and a heterosexual man are both men so it doesn't even make sense. Are people threatened or uncomfortable knowing that not everyone wants to do the same things they do?

It's all just so silly. There is room for almost everyone to just be who they want to be and coexist peacefully. It can happen, why can't we just let it happen? Live and let live.

Can you sue somebody for that?

2007-04-02T23:33:00.000-05:00

I often used to ask my dad " Can you sue somebody for that?" He would answer that "You can file suit for anything but it doesn't mean you'll win." You'd think that he was the lawyer in the family, not my mom. Actually he's the realist.

Anyway, I came across the silly video(imagine that - a silly video on the internet!) by Wierd Al and it made me think of our litigious society.

I'll Sue Ya

Add to My Profile More Videos

This isn't an overtly political blog

2007-03-25T10:36:00.000-05:00

but sometimes I speak my mind straight-up and sometimes what I'm thinking about is political.

This country is not how I would like it to be but most people are fine with it. Sure the polls show Bush only has about a 30% approval rating but what are people doing about it? Most are doing nothing to effect meaningful change. Of those who are, many are backing politicians they are comfortable with who will preserve the structure of consolidated wealth and power that is the root cause of our current state of the union.

This happened in Massachusetts when people voted for Deval Patrick instead of Grace Ross. Deval is a joke. I would much rather have a Republican in office. At least a Republican generally doesn't pretend to want to help most people, care about the people without a voice or advocate for equality on any level for many segments of the population. Deval is already not delivering on some of his promises(like funding for the State Parks) and is exceeding his predeccesor in the anti-consumer and the anti-environment fronts. He drives a bigger and more expensive SUV and has started using a helicopter when he's not in the SUV(oh yeah, Massachusetts is such a huge state!). Since being in office he made a call on behalf of a sub-prime(predatory) lender that he was paid $300.000/year to be on the board of. Ethics - guess those are for the little people.

Where am I going with this rant? We all, the regular people that is, would have been better off with somebody who would have served us, not the corporate power structure. Grace Ross would have done that but the sheep were ignorant and the people who knew were scared and we all got screwed.

It will happen again in 2008. Most people will vote for a fake alternative that won't effect meaningful change. I don't have the answers but I have decided what I'm doing. I'm going to support Dennis Kucinich, who is running again in the Democratic Primary, and I will also continue to support the Green Party.

I have already signed-up on Dennis's website and just received this email from his wife:

It Is Time To Take A Strong Stand

Today as the Democratic leadership celebrates the passage of HR 1591, Dennis and I are in mourning. We mourn the deaths of those who have passed and those whose lives are now on the line, both in the military and civilian Iraqis. We mourn the destruction, the ecocide. We mourn with families in Iraq and the US who will see more death and devastation. We mourn the callous and calculated political spin cloaking the Congress' hawkish support of war, with the rhetoric of peace.

Congressman Kucinich voted NO. Standing firm with him on this NO vote were 13 Democrats: John Barrow [GA], Dan Boren [OK], Lincoln Davis [TN], Barbara Lee [CA], John Lewis [GA], Jim Marshall [GA], Jim Matheson [UT], Michael McNulty [NY], Michael Michaud [ME], Gene Taylor [MS], Maxine Waters [CA], Diane Watson [CA], and Lynn Woolsey [CA].

I would like to thank Iraq Veterans Against the War, Military Families Speak Out, Veterans for Peace, Code Pink, Gold Star Mothers and all those other organizations who have worked so valiantly in recent years to raise awareness about what is going on in Iraq and to end the war. We would also like to thank the other 13 Democrats who voted against the additional Administration's appropriation request of $120 billion.

$120 billion for an escalation of the war, the privatization of Iraqi oil assets and a possible extension of the war into Iran. And the President said he will veto this because it's not enough. By showing such a weak position against the Administration and the war, the Democrats have thoroughly undermined whatever bargaining position they could have had.

Americans must be heard. It is time to take a strong stand for the end of the war and for peace. It is time to return to the town halls of America to develop a powerful movement for change.

In peace and with love,

Elizabeth Kucinich

The Republocrats are starting to brawl

2007-03-22T23:17:00.000-05:00

Let's get this party started right...
Let's get this party started quickly!

With 10 months until Open Season(aka the first primary), the gloves are already coming off. This ad attacking Clinton and promoting Obama could have just as easily been a Republican production.

But what's the difference? The leading democrat candidates are tripping over each other in their rush to cater to Republican voters while almost all contenders are jostling to stake out "support the troops but not the war" positions of some type or another.

Whatever. Why don't we try to elect somebody who isn't part of the establishment. Somebody who has ethics, values and cares about the regular person. I would say that we would have to go outside of the one party system(the Corporate Party) that pretends to offer the choice of two parties but we do have one candidate who represents real and meaningful change and has substance: Dennis Kucinch. I will support him and whatever candidate that the Green Party runs. We deserve better, for our sake, for the world's sake and for the sake of those to come.

Oh yeah, Here's the video that has over 2 million views in 24 hours. It's a mash-up of an advertisement that Apple ran during the 1984 Superbowl to introduce the Mac.

My second run of 2007

2007-03-18T20:20:00.000-05:00

I am a runner. I like to run 6 - 9 times per week. That would mean that I normally would have run about 80 times in 2007.

I've run twice. On January 16th I ran 16 miles in Derry, NH and today I ran a 1/2 marathon in New Bedford, MA. My performance in both races was below mediocre due to my complete lack of training. It actually amazes me that I finished them both in the middle of the pack.

My body still works well and I'm no longer sick so now it's time to train. More than once a month. More than once a week. Maybe even more than once a day

Today I will do what you won't so tomorrow I can do what you can't!

Gender Crash Continues to Rock the House!

2007-03-17T14:38:00.000-05:00

I recently went to Gender Crash! again. It's an open mic night for the LGBTQQ community. I tend to think of myself as questioning in that I question the use of gender and the barriers created by societal constructs. I think this subject is probably more difficult for many people than race since it is hard for people to place these labels correctly based solely on appearance.

Gender Crash! is a wonderful community event with so many talented people speaking from the heart. I love the people, the energy, the spirit. One moment I'm laughing, the next I'm crying, the next I'm outraged. It is just one more reminder of why I support Spontaneous Celebrations(where it's held) and why I love living in JP! Although I am not a member of the LGBT community, I am a friend and supporter.

Anyway, back to me...I guess the appropriate term for me to use would actually be Queer since I reject distinct sexual identities because I think they are oppressive. The full definition is:

In contemporary usage, some use queer as an inclusive, unifying sociopolitical umbrella term for people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered, transsexual, intersexual, genderqueer, or of any other non-heterosexual sexuality, sexual anatomy, or gender identity. It can also include asexual and autosexual people, as well as gender normative heterosexuals whose sexual orientations or activities place them outside the heterosexual-defined mainstream (e.g. BDSM practitioners, or polyamorous persons). Queer in this sense (depending on how broadly it is defined) is commonly used as a synonym for such terms as LGBT. Because of the context in
which it was reclaimed, queer has sociopolitical connotations, and is often
preferred by those who are activists, by those who strongly reject traditional
gender identities, by those who reject distinct sexual identities such as gay, lesbian, bisexual and straight, and by those who see themselves as oppressed by the heteronormativity of the larger culture. In this usage it retains the historical connotation of "outside the bounds of normal society" and can be construed as "breaking the rules for sex and gender." It can be preferred because of its ambiguity, which allows "queer" identifying people to avoid the sometimes strict boundaries that surround other labels. In this context "queer" is not a synonym for LGBT as it creates a space for "queer" heterosexuals and "non-queer" (straight-acting, conformist) homosexuals.

In honor of GenderCrash and Queerness, here's a list that my friend Bobby sent me:

I am the boy who never finished high school, because I got called a fag everyday

I am the girl kicked out of her home because I confided in my mother
that I am a lesbian.

I am the prostitute working the streets because
nobody will hire a transsexual woman.

I am the sister who holds her gay
brother tight through the painful, tear-filled nights.

We are the
parents who buried our daughter long before her time.

I am the man who
died alone in the hospital because they would not let my partner of twenty-seven
years into the room.

I am the foster child who wakes up with nightmares
of being taken away from the two fathers who are the only loving family I have
ever had. I wish they could adopt me.

I am not one of the lucky ones. I
killed myself just weeks before graduating high school. It was simply too much
to bear.

We are the couple who had the realtor hang up on us when she
found out we wanted to rent a one-bedroom for two men.

I am the person
who never knows which bathroom I should use if I want to avoid getting the
management called on me.

I am the mother who is not allowed to even
visit the children I bore, nursed, and raised. The court says I am an unfit
mother because I now live with another woman.

I am the domestic-violence
survivor who found the support system grow suddenly cold and distant when they
found out my abusive partner is also a woman.

I am the domestic-violence
survivor who has no support system to turn to because I am male.

I am
the father who has never hugged his son because I grew up afraid to show
affection to other men.

I am the home-economics teacher who always
wanted to teach gym until someone told me that only lesbians do that.

I
am the woman who died when the EMTs stopped treating me as soon as they realized
I was transsexual. (yes, this actually happened)

I am the person who
feels guilty because I think I could be a much better person if I didnt have to
always deal with society hating me.

I am the man who stopped attending
church, not because I don't believe, but because they closed their doors to my
kind.

I am the person who has to hide what this world needs most, love.

I am the person ashamed to tell my own friends im a lesbian, because
they constantly make fun of them.

I am the boy tied to a fence, beaten
to a bloody pulp and left to die because two straight men wanted to "teach me a
lesson"

I am the person that cannot be him self in his house cause my
parents are religious and in the bible it says that Adam is suppose to be with
Eve not with Steve.

In memory of Rachel Corrie

2007-03-16T11:26:00.000-05:00

Rachel Corrie is one of my heroes. A little over four years ago she left her middle class life as a college student to go to Palestine with the International Solidarity Movement. The presence of US and Europeans often allows the Palestinians to pick olives, tend crops and live their lives with reduced harassment for the Israeli Occupying Forces. She was asked to help protect a Palestinian Doctor's house from being leveled. She responded and stood in front of the house in bright clothing, refusing to budge while a 60 ton armored bulldozer manufactured in the US by CAT anddriven by Israeli soldiers approached her. The soldier was aggravated and continued to move forward, threatening her before running directly over her, crushing her causing immediate death. Nobody was held responsible for her murder. The US Government was silent about the murder of a US Citizen by soldiers of another government. The Israeli government blamed Rachel for being in a restricted area.

Rachel gave up her comforts and put her life on the line for something that was important to her. She lived her ideals and values. She did not want to die but she was willing to. I don't know her but I love her, I respect her and I miss her. Everytime I write about her, tears well-up in my eyes and then start to stream down my face. I am so sad that she died. I know that the world needs more inspirations like Rachel. People who will give freely of themselves and practice nonviolence in the face of aggression.

I was already moderately active 4 years ago but Rachel's death moved me. I became much more driven and moved to action. I don't have all the answers. I don't think Rachel did either, but she moved way outside of her comfort zone and took meaningful action to help people. If the world had a million Rachel's it would be a wonderful place.

3 16 03 We Will Never Forget

Got Corn? It does a liver & kidney bad.

2007-03-15T11:00:00.000-05:00

Most people won't find this shocking. GMO corn has been shown to cause kidney and liver damage. Shocking - FrankenFood isn't good for you, who would have thought??? Maybe the 600,000 member of the Organic Consumers Association, the members of GreenPeace, most of the members of the public in Europe, Eurpean and African governments, family farmers in the United States.

Who didn't think it was harmful? The US Media(paid for by US Corporations), the US Government(paid for by US Corporations), the US Grain Council(evil nonprofit paid for by US Corporations), much of the US public(aka the sheep), and the US Corporations.

You might think that you're not consuming GMO corn, but if you're eating the oh so sad SAD(standard american diet) then you most certainly are. GMO products are in: most soft drinks, breads, cookies, crackers, cereals, frozen dinners, salsa, ketchup, mayonnaise, even Gatorade, granola bars and Morningstar patties!

Of course all of you already knew this and have stopped eating GMO products since you read my post last April.

I've listed links to two articles on the most recent news and a couple of links to previous instances highlighting problems with GMO. This is just the beginning folks. GMO is the greatest science experiment every performed and we are both the test subjects and the victims of it!

GMO corn causes liver, kidney problems in rats: study

Strong Suspicions of Toxicity in One GMO Corn

Monsanto to Public: Ignore the Rats and Eat the GMO CornOCA Reacts to Monsanto's Latest GMO Deception

STUDY RESULT NOT FINAL PROOF BT CORN HARMFUL TO FARMERS

Who isn't on MySpace?

2007-03-05T10:52:00.000-05:00

I now manage 3 MySpace accounts and help with one other.

There's my personal one: http://www.myspace.com/onlifesterms
The one for Conscious Consuming: http://www.myspace.com/consciousconsuming
The one for Grassroots International: http://www.myspace.com/grassrootsinternational
and I help with Whats Up Magazine: http://www.myspace.com/whatsupmagazine

I don't spend much time on my own but I do manage one MySpace group via that account. I spend lots of time on Conscious Consuming and Grassroots International since they both have over 2,000 friends and there are lots of friend requests made to both and messages sent, comments made, etc. I also try to grow both of them(and Whats Up as well). It's fascinating how much time people spend on MySpace. I'm trying to tap into that and am having some success. It's a whole other world but it's been treating us well so far!

Conscious Consuming is on the Web and Web 2.0!

2007-02-23T10:47:00.000-05:00

Conscious Consuming is coming of age!

We are now an official tax-exempt 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization!

We have a brand new and awesome website: www.consciousconsuming.org

We have a vibrant presence on MySpace: www.myspace.com/consciousconsuming
and on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/ConsciousConsuming

Now all we need is some money so we can stop paying for everything out of our own pockets. Hopefully that will come soon but we're moving right along at this point so it's all good!

Let the Elimination Diet Begin!

2007-02-15T10:34:00.000-05:00

OK, it's official. No more gluten, sugar(or other days. This will be an interesting experience. I've been planning for it and I think it will be easy to do at home and a challenge when I travel.

It's amazing how many things have gluten, soy and/or dairy in them. Then there's the matter of purity. Oats don't have gluten in them so they should be fine, but they aren't. Oats are processed and stored using the same equipment that is used for grains such as wheat so there is cross-contamination. This is significant enough to cause serious problems for somebody who is intolerant of gluten. A couple of farmers who were intolerant set-up a pure supply chain so I was able to order gluten-free oatmeal on the internet. I've also stocked-up on brown rice, quinoa and tuna fish.

We'll see how it goes!