Argh! Sound worm! Peter Frampton, I hates you!

And I blame it all on a local radio station that's been playing Peter Frampton's hit songs from his 1977 album--Baby, I Love Your  Way, Show Me the Way and Do You Feel Like We Do. I feel like I'm living Ground Hog Day. Seriously, this station plays these songs at roughly the same time every morning, and now I can't get them out of my head!

And then there's *this* earworm

And then there's the fact I can't get the theme music from The Godfather out of my head, either. One of the cable channels has been playing marathons of all three Godfather movies repeatedly over the past week, and the Guy has recorded 1 and 2 (but not 3). Anyhow. So now THAT music won't leave me alone!

***this was a short break in the middle of a long lesson on the steno machine!***

(no subject)

There's an interesting Peter Straub interview here. One of the quotes that stuck out as I read it was this one:

"That gave me the opportunity to wake up Tim Underhill from the dream world and bring him back into my real world, so l could spend more time with him and enjoy myself in the way you do when you see someone you've been missing. It sounds a little like The Twilight Zone, but the people a writer makes up have a great deal of reality to their inventor."

That seems to be true for many writers-is it true for you? It's certainly true for readers, who love series of books that revisit their favorite characters time and again.

Writer's Block: Crepuscular Drama

[Error: unknown template qotd]couldn't care less.

Jason Mamoa attacked with a beer glass: 140 stitches used to repair his face

LA TIMES article released today: Jason Mamoa (Ronan Dex) attacked in Hollywood and has facial surgery to repair glass damage to his face. 140 stitches were used during his reconstructive surgery.

Thought the Atlantis fans on my flist would want to know.

Mammoths to walk again?

Mammoth gene nearing completion--well, the mapping of it, anyhow.

I wonder how soon it will be until we have mammoths walking the earth again, a la Jurassic Park?

New study indicates that forward facing babies face a life of stress

There's a British study saying that babies in forward facing buggies (strollers to us Yanks).

Here's what the article starts out with: Having infants facing their parent gives them positive reassurance and reduces mental stress, said the study by researchers at Dundee University in Scotland, believed to be the first of its kind.  [snippage]

....The findings were based on studying nearly 3,000 parent-infant pairs, including an experiment where babies were pushed for a mile, half the time facing their parent, and half the time facing away.

Okay now, more for parents to feel guilty about.  I don't see an age range mentioned, but I guess the babies here would be between 3 and 18 months of age? Now, I know I had both of my kids in their strollers facing forward because, well, there aren't any backward facing strollers available here in the US (at least not that I could find that were affordable). I don't think they're damaged in the least. And I haven't heard them complaining about their forward facing strollers! If anything, the little snippets love forward facing thrill rides like roller coasters.

I think this is a problem only if you have a tense baby to begin with, or one with separation anxiety. It's commons sense that babies like to hear their parent's voice, and see their mommies faces. But honest. It won't kill the poor little bebes to be deprived for the length of a walk to face forward!

And lastly, Nebraska overhauls its child abandonment law

Nebraska changes law on abandonment of children of all ages

Nebraska state lawmakers on Friday overhauled a law that allowed people to abandon their children of any age legally at hospitals, a senator's office confirmed. 

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A new law put the age limit for the so-called safe haven law at 30 days (one month) for a newborn, according to the office of Senator Arnie Stuthman.

The change came in a special session called by Governor Dave Heineman in a 43-5 vote.

The prior safe haven law approved in July was meant to apply to infants but ended up -- because there was no age specified -- allowing parents to abandon many children including teens as old as 17 at area hospitals.

Legislators passed the new bill stating: "no person should be prosecuted for any crime based solely upon the act of leaving a child 30 days old or younger in the custody of an employee on duty at an hospital licensed by the state of Nebraska," an aide to Stuthman said.

Embarrassed by the magnitude of the problem after 34 children -- mostly anonymous -- were handed over to the state, the governor called earlier this month for the state legislature to revise the law and specify an age limit.

On one day in September, 11 children, aged between one and 17 and some from the same family, were abandoned at a Nebraska hospital.

© 2008 AFP

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34 children dropped off at in Nebraska. That's amazing. I'd heard (though haven't confirmed) that some of those parents/guardians drove in from out of state to let the state of Nebraska deal with their children, instead of going through child services in their own states.