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Wednesday, April 11, 2012
3 Months Isn't Enough!
The reasons women go back to work very early include:
1) Loss of income
2) Fear of missing training/schooling
3) Pressure from peers
4) Fear of loss of job
Some women will cite "boredom" as a reason for going back to work early, but I honestly don't believe that if all the other factors were eliminated, they would make the same choice.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that three months isn't enough. I'm not the kind of woman who wants to stay home indefinitely, but three months is just way too short. Six months is more like it.
Here's why:
1) Unless you have an amazing support system, you're still a mess at three months. Yes, your baby is supposed to sleep through the night at this point, but did you know that "sleeping through the night" is actually defined as sleeping five hours in a row? And that humans should be getting at least eight hours of sleep per night? So unless you're a dolphin or something, you're waking up at least once per night. You're not even close to functioning at full capacity, likely making lots of mistakes.
2) In all honesty, having done it myself, I feel like three months is too young for a baby to be in daycare. Babies that age need a lot of attention and it's so pathetic how they just lie there and can't really interact on their own. By six months, they're sitting up and almost crawling, so it's not so bad. Plus daycare is a vector for disease that their immature immune systems can't handle as well, so you're guaranteed to get lots of "pick up sick kid" calls, which further decreases your work reliability. Of course, a lot of women opt for a nanny, but that's its own set of problems.
3) The recommendation is to give breastmilk exclusively for the first six months, but that is no easy task to accomplish when you're working full time. It either puts even more strain on your employment or causes you to give up.
4) I personally felt like I wasn't emotionally ready at three months to leave the baby. Maybe that's not a good reason. Or maybe it's the only good reason.
I guess I only came up with four reasons, but I think they're four really good reasons. Unfortunately, the reasons for going back early are even more compelling.
32 comments:
Completely agree!! How is it possible that all other developed nations give moms plenty of time to recover, and we only get a measly three months (and, during residency, only 6 weeks :-O !!)??ReplyDelete
It baffles the mind.
Why are the only two options a) go back full time and work 60-80 hours per week immediately, and b) stay home full time?ReplyDelete
I personally couldn't wait to go back to work/school (I went back after 8 weeks), but I also am in grad school and have a very flexible schedule and have been able to ease back into it. I actually don't think I realized just how miserable I was staying home full time until I went back for that first meeting about a month ago.
I am probably working about 40 hours per week now, not including time to pump / breastfeed. (I also worked over maternity leave, but that's because I'd prefer to work while my baby nursed than to watch tv or do nothing). It's been more or less ideal for me. It's too bad more people don't have this option, because I think many people would be happy to be back doing some sort of work at 8 weeks if they had the support system (and the right job). Just not 80 hours of it.
Yeah, all the other countries seem to get it. What's wrong with us?ReplyDelete
OMDG: I agree. A few of the therapists I know came back to work doing either per diem or like two days a week. That's a reasonable option that I suspect most women don't have available to them.ReplyDelete
Because people in this country don't want to pay for it through higher taxes? Many think, "Why should we be subsidizing maternity leave when women should just quit their jobs to be home with their kids?"ReplyDelete
I have been thinking a lot about this lately as 2 of the 4 doctors in my group are currently pregnant. Let me be clear that I am exstatic for both of them and I am happy to cover for them while they are on leave.... but the next 6 months are going to be EXTREMELY challenging. Both are planning to only take 6 weeks off, but the call and financial burden this is going to place on our group will be large. We are a private practice and we own our own business our overhead is tight, so we really can't afford to bring in locums. I will most likely not get vacation or time off for 6 months while I am covering.ReplyDelete
Yes in an ideal world taking a longer time off would be ideal. But its not realistic in most settings.
When we take maternity leaves we still have to pay our overhead : rent, employees, malpractice, ect. For a private practice OB to take 3 months off they would need at least %120, 000 just to cover overhead. Is it really realistic to ask the government or other to pay that?ReplyDelete
RH: Well, what do countries like Canada do, where women get a year off?ReplyDelete
I'm not suggesting I know what the solution is. But I do think that three months is not enough time and six weeks is just ridiculous, especially if you're going back to a busy OB/GYN practice. Do patients get worse care as a result? Probably. Does the baby get optimal care? Probably not.
Maybe someday, much like with the Bell Commission, a female physician will come back to work at 6 weeks and make a tragic error, and then maybe some changes will result. What changes? I don't know.
I completely agree with your post Fizzy. A number of my friends have taken maternal/paternal leave here in Canada during residency, and having up to a year off has been a really good thing for them and their kids. They actually get to enjoy some of their kids' infancy and to be present for many of the important milestones, rather than at the hospital wishing to be home. And because 6-12 months is a fairly standard parental leave for residents, there isn't a stigma against it or a sense that residents are missing out on their training. They just go back to where they left off when the leave ends and extend their residency so they get the same amount of training as everyone else.ReplyDelete
As for how it's paid for, in my province a portion of the parental leave costs are paid by our employment insurance system (which pays all parents on parental leave) and the remainder are paid by the local medical association out of member dues. For overhead, I imagine it varies from practice to practice. Most practices charge overhead as a percentage of physician revenues, so the overhead would go to little or nothing when the parent isn't working. I think most clinics make up for the gap in overhead fees by charging more than is necessary (i.e. creating a reserve fund) and by having the remaining practice members work longer hours to cover for the person on parental leave (which is entirely feasible when there are 5-10 docs in a given practice).
Are there any local or national residency associations in the States that are advocating for longer parental leave? My province has only had good parental leave benefits for the past 5-10 years, and they only came into place because a group of committed residents (male and female) fought to have up to a year of parental leave included in our union contract.
SD -- I think the two key words from your comment that explain everything are, "union" and "contract."ReplyDelete
I am at the end of my second maternity leave and 100% agree with OMDG's first statement - I soooo wish there was a solution between 80 hours and staying home full time for another 3 months. Sigh.ReplyDelete
RH: I was just thinking about the situation you mentioned and I have a question for you. You're in a physically demanding profession... what if it gets to be too much for one or both of your colleagues and they need to go on bedrest for an extended period of time? What if one of them has to take 6 weeks of absolute bedrest... what would she then do about maternity leave? (Presumably the answer is not to come back to work the day after delivery.) What if there are complications with the delivery or newborns that require them to take significantly more than the 6 weeks? What would your practice do? Would you just sink?ReplyDelete
I swear, I'm not asking these questions to be a snarky bitch. I am asking respectfully and I am genuinely curious to hear your answers. It sounds like things are spread tight in your practice, so I'd guess it's something you may have thought about, considering you know better than anyone about possible complications. I feel like half the female physicians I know ended up on bedrest during their pregnancies.
One of the reasons I moved back to Canada from the US for med school and beyond was maternity leave.ReplyDelete
As described above, taking maternity (or parental if you're a father/partner/adoptive parent) DURING RESIDENCY is relatively easy and at least partially paid.
Once you're done residency it's a completely different story. Even in Canada most physicians I know take only about 3 months. Many are essentially "self-employed" and therefore aren't eligible for the same government maternity leave as any true "employee" would be. There are group insurance-type plans that you can buy into but they're quite expensive. We also need to find someone to cover our practice which is just as difficult as it is in the US.
It's better up here for sure but it's far from perfect... but to me it's worth it to have a career I love AND a wonderful family.
We have asked our 2 part time NPs to go full time for this summer. Myself and the other non preggo partner are working extended hours and call.
We are hoping for the best, but if they do have to go on bedrest we will just do the best we can.
One of our partners had to go on bedrest a few years ago. We all just worked extra and she took out a loan to cover her expenses.
In reality the bills have to be paid and the patients have to be taken care of... regardless of who is on maternity leave.
There is no 80 hour work week in the real world.
We chose private practice for the flexibilty that it offers, but being self employed does have its downside.
I hope it works out for you, RH. But honestly, that situation sucks and it's not uncommon in medicine. Sometimes I wonder if premeds truly understood some of the sacrifices they'd have to make, they might choose differently. But I guess that's a whole other discussion.ReplyDelete
To add to SD and JustMe's comments about the situation in Canada - in my province, the residency association will top up our government employment insurance to 85% of our salary, which is a bit below $50 000/yr, for the first 17 weeks. After that, we can stay on leave categorized as "parental leave" for the remainder of the year, however during those 35 weeks I believe we receive just the standard government EI rate, which is around 40% of salary up to a max of in the $40 000/yr range, so around $1600/month.ReplyDelete
In BC, through the provincial physicians' association, after practicing for a year you can receive maternity benefits of $1000/week for up to 17 weeks. As mentioned before usually physicians are self-employed and don't qualify for the government EI as we do as residents, so this could be a tight financial situation if you are covering overhead as well.
Solitary Diner - in BC at least, from my understanding if you're billing the public system, MSP, it would be difficult and illegal to "charge more than is necessary" to make up the difference in the overhead cost to the remaining partners while one is on leave, because every visit is coded to a specific value down to the cent.
Based on my anecdotal discussions, in Canada many attendings and residents view residency as the more advantageous time to have children, and as a resident who is hoping for children during residency I'm thankful for the current environment.
I've even heard of a male surgery resident taking a few months of paternity leave.
This is an interesting comparison of benefits across Canada from our residency matching program, CaRMS:
Another benefit of kids during residency for us in Canada - the resident plus his or her partners and children are covered under the extended health plan, which continues during leave.ReplyDelete
- AnonymousApril 11, 2012 at 8:25 PM
I feel like the most blessed medical student in the world. I'd made plans to spend a 5th year of medical school getting an MPH between my 2nd and 3rd year and it happens to be all independent work which allow me to be at home. I happen to be due to deliver in time to give me 11 months at home with the baby before returning to rotations. Granted I will be doing graduate work, but again, I think it's such a blessing.ReplyDelete
I'm a first-time mom, 20 weeks pregnant, starting pathology residency in July, and due September 2nd. First of all, this wasn't "supposed" to happen just yet (we tried for 6 months earlier in the year and failed--so I was incredibly surprised to get a positive test 2 days after my last interview when we weren't even trying), but my program director and chief have been as supportive as I could have hoped for. I will join the 'Six Weeks Off' club so I can finish residency on time without having to give up future years' vacation time, and I am already insanely jealous of everyone who qualifies for FMLA or any other extended leave because they have a regular job (as apparently inadequate as three months off is).ReplyDelete
I will not have a single vacation day for the remainder of my first year of training, and will accumulate just one sick day a month until next July. Here's hoping everyone's immune system holds up!!
- AnonymousApril 11, 2012 at 9:57 PM
I agree that 12 weeks is too short for maternity leave. I took 6 weeks and was practically asleep for the next 12 weeks while I tried to juggle breastfeeding/newborn/make-up call/tests/research etc. But I can't imagine taking off a year during my training. A longer maternity leave appeals to me but trying to relearn/refresh/catch up everything a year later might be just as stressful as returning earlier and not missing as much training. Don't get me wrong, I wish I had more time with my daughter after she was born...but I didn't sign up for long hours/call and 12 years of post-graduate training because it was a family-friendly profession. Of course, that doesn't mean we can't strive to make things better....I think the person who suggested returning to work part-time after maternity leave is on to something.ReplyDelete
I personally agree that 3 months is not enough...for me. I know everybody is different. But it certainly would be nice to have the option to take 6 months off, and be 'supported' by our peers/departments etc. As a Canadian, and a family physician trained in Canada, my point of view seems to be so different from that of my peers here in Houston. I took 6 months off after my son was born, 3 months paid, 3 months unpaid and boy it was difficult for me to get those 3 months unpaid leave without them firing me. I was made to feel guilty, and at the same time I felt patronized whenever I said I just wanted to be able to spend time with my newborn and that I couldn't pump given my busy schedule. (there realy was no time for me to pump in the clinic I work in)ReplyDelete
I don't like the way medicine is evolving in general. I didn't go into medicine because I liked business. I truly went into med because I love to care for people. I was constantly told that 'Dr. so-and-so, you have to understand, we are running a business here...', and as much as understand that medicine is a business especially here in the US, I don't F#$#@!n care because frankly I'm just sick of hearing it.
I'm going to have to be the dissenting voice here. Or at least emphasize, as others have, that everyone is different. I took 12 weeks, and it was exactly the right amount of time-- for me. 6 weeks would have been too short. But at 12 weeks, I had a stock of frozen milk, my child was sleeping 12 hours a night (sorry), and, frankly, a 3 month old isn't very interesting (though much more interesting than a 1 month old) for hours at a time. In truth, I went in to work for a couple of hours a couple of times a week (with my baby) starting when she was about 2 weeks old.ReplyDelete
Of course, I was 38, an academic anesthesiologist, and 6 months from going up for tenure. So we could afford a full time nanny (allowing our child to sleep until 8 no matter when we left) and lots of people to help us around the house. And I really really love my job, which made going back feel like a vacation not an imposition.
I completely agree that 3 months is not enough. Our little guy wasn't even close to sleeping through the night at that stage. Luckily, I have a very supportive boss who allowed me to come back part-time at that time. I truly appreciated the easing back in. By the time the baby was 6 months old I felt much more ready to be back full time. I think so much of this depends on your work setting. We have a group of (mostly women) pediatricians. We essentially take turns being on maternity leave and support each other by covering call, etc. The norm in the group is to actually take more like 4-6 months of leave (although much is unpaid, so this doesn't work for everyone). I think so much depends on the culture in the workplace.ReplyDelete
- AnonymousApril 12, 2012 at 12:32 AM
I am at the end of my second maternity leave. I had 2 kids in the last two years while doing intern year in medicine and first year of radiology. My first baby was a "7 week baby" right before I started intern year. I managed to breastfeed her for 1 year, although I did not perform to my standards during intern year. My second baby is also a "7 week baby" + 1 week bed rest. I feel terribly guilty for taking 2 "extra" weeks off from residency and even though our chiefs are incredibly supportive, I am terrified of what my co-residents are "truly" thinking of my taking 2 whole months for maternity leave/bedrest. I am also not ready to go back to work in a few days. I need more time with my children, but unfortunately this will not happen. I will be back reading films in a dark room after sleepless nights. There will be lots of coffee involved and luckily my freezer is stocked with breastmilk. I will also work my hardest to perform up to my standards - hopefully it will be different this time. Why will I do this? Because I love my job, I love my residency, and the hope that one day my children will be proud of their mommy for achieving her dreams. Would I change anything? Yes, there needs to be an option for women to choose how much time they need to spend with their newborns. We each know how much time we need with our particular children. And I am not even asking to be paid during the time off. I would be happy with an option of unpaid time off without the repercussions of loosing my job. One day this will happen in the USA, unfortunately this is not the time. Why do I believe that this will happen? Women are a very important part of the workforce and by having such unsupportive maternity leave policy we end up loosing a large part of them either through having them come back to work sleep deprived or leaving the workforce all together. By supporting maternity leave, businesses will become open to new employment paradigms (such as share programs, partnerships, exchanges, etc). And in the end, the society will benefit in numerous ways. It is amazing what a mother can do, especially when she is respected to make decisions about her family!ReplyDelete
- AnonymousApril 12, 2012 at 8:19 AM
Commenter above - what you are hoping will not happen for reasons RH cited. This country is not like any other in the world. People here resist any "government" involvement without understanding it makes life easier and more pleasant for the rest of the world. And on their own people are forced "to take out a loan" when they need bedrest. (Struck me to my heart, RH, feel sorry for you and your colleagues to be working in such setting).ReplyDelete
- AnonymousApril 12, 2012 at 8:33 AM
This conversation has made me thank my lucky stars that I live in Australia. As a doctor-in-training (resident in th US) I am entitled to (and not begrudged) a years leave to be primary care giver. 10 weeks is paid full time, 18 weeks at minimum wage and the rest unpaid. By law I have the option to negotiate part time or flexible work on my return. Our system is not perfect by any means, but sounds like a big step up from yours.ReplyDelete
Dr BabyFace
Marley - Sorry to be unclear. When I spoke of "charging more than necessary" I was referring to the overhead fees that physicians pay to their office/work group. It's my understanding that at least some of the work groups will charge their physicians more than the actual cost of overhead (e.g. 25% of salary when 22% of salary is enough to cover expenses) so that they will have a contingency fund to cover expenses when members of the group aren't working as much (e.g. parental leave, sick leave, retirement). It definitely isn't possible to bill the government extra for services!ReplyDelete
- AnonymousApril 12, 2012 at 10:44 AM
I am a Canadian physician, and I took 6 months - 17 weeks of which was paid by medical association benefits (2 of those weeks were spend waiting for the Dude to finally make an appearance...), so Dude was 5.5 months when I went back.ReplyDelete
My job is in academia, and my division is supportive. I returned part-time for one month, then moved to full-time. Did the pumping thing for months 5.5 to 13.
Anyhow - the difference for me? My husband was able to make use of Canada's benefits to do pat leave from 5.5 months to 12 months, when our son started daycare. It was WAY easier leaving the Dude with my husband. I was totally ready to go back (I actually did a course towards my M.Ed while on mat leave starting at 3 months). The one month of part-time work was a good transition for us, and then we were good to go.
I completely realize this is not an option in many places, but it is totally an option in Canada (the dad taking the bulk of the parental leave - they're allowed 35 weeks) and very few people do it.
Regardless, I was pretty ready for work at 3 months, but I mostly just did my own academic stuff plus the M.Ed course. I did have a sleeper, and a husband who was also fine to get up in the night when breasts were not required. Lucky all around, I realize.
To be clear - if you're self-employed in Canada, you don't get the 12 months, so many self-employed moms, (which is most MDs) are back at work early. In my province, MDs get 17 weeks of much reduced income, but it's a heck of a lot better than none.
However, having the choice to take time vs. not is key here - and the lack of choice is appalling.
My thoughts are with you, Fizzy. I should be doing academic work right now, but I had to respond to this. : )
I firmly believe there is a larger issue at play here. It is not the specific details of our innumerable maternity leave schemes (depending on your state, your industry, your employer, etc.), but the overall treatment of women and children in our society.ReplyDelete
Here in the US we systematically devalue women and children. No, I am not some raging feminist, but I have had the benefit of living in Europe (not just being a tourist) and nowhere have I felt like women and children were relegated to a secondary position to the extent they are here in the US.
A priori, women have to keep proving themselves, as if constantly saying "Please master, do not send me away! Thank you master, for allowing me to be here!" in most industries.
I am not someone who could be a SAHM for very long at all. I went back to school 2 weeks after each child, but I was lucky to have uncomplicated births and healthy babies, to be an undergraduate and then a graduate student with incredible flexibility and a husband with a good job. However, I am more than willing to support women who need more time, especially if they are in inflexible situations. Yes, I am willing to put a percentage of ALL my earnings towards helping our society care for our mothers and children. However, my personal ethos seems to go against the growing trend of "Why should I have to take care of someone else? Why should MY money go to help some woman who chose to get pregnant? Why should I have to contribute to somebody else's babies?" (and these are very benign statements, the actual vitriol I have seen/heard many people direct at mothers and children is too hateful, crass and shocking to recount).
We set up Medicare for older people and ESRD patients, because older people (and 43 y.o. white men appearing to have a life out of a Rockwell painting until ESRD hit them, ref. Shep Glazer) have importance in our society (read: they have most of the money and they vote). Yet, we cannot set up a system to take care of our mothers and babies that is worthy of a developed nation.
[End Rant]
- AnonymousApril 12, 2012 at 8:45 PM
I was surprised to read about two things- one is that official maternity time off in the US is 3 months - somehow I thought that it was mere 6 weeks.....Maybe because that what my residency offered me the first time around....ReplyDelete
Another thing I was surprised about - somebody posted that these 6 weeks in residency don't prolong your residency??? In my case ( or maybe it's just my residency?) it did indeed prolong my residency by 6 weeks.... Not that matters to me but still....
I do think that there are moms who are ready and want to go back to work at 3 months: those with great support systems or who have jobs with flexible hours. Even if you ordinarily love your job, you're probably not going to love it so much if you're dropping your infant off at a daycare where they get sick once a week, you don't have a minute in your day to pump, you're exhausted because you were awake during the night feeding the baby, and you're scrambling to get out of work in time for pick-up. Not an unusual situation at all in medicine, unfortunately.ReplyDelete
WhiteCoat: YES! Can't agree more.
Most recent anon: In many residencies, you are allowed to miss 6 weeks in a given year for medical or family reasons and not have to make that time up. That was the case in my residency. FMLA allows 12 weeks, but a lot of women take 6, possibly because that's when the first postnatal appointment is so you're expected to be "healed" by then.
- AnonymousApril 30, 2012 at 10:08 PM
I feel like you all are living on a different planet. I am a surgery resident, and I got exactly four weeks. When my baby was less than a month old, I was back in the trauma bay- and while many of you blithely cite "80 hour weeks," the truth of the matter is that nearly all of you are in medical specialties where your hours rarely ever approach that. I am on transplant surgery right now with q2 call and 40+ hour shifts, and I had absolutely no choice in the matter. No option to voluntarily prolong my residency and take unpaid leave. I have a 7wk old son whom I spend every non-hospital minute with.ReplyDelete
And in case you're curious,I don't feel 4 wks is enough! And do you seriously think I can pump breast milk every three hours? I'm lucky if I can do it q6.


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January 22nd, 2009
Can weather affect our health?
As a new feature of CNNhealth.com, our team of expert doctors will answer readers' questions. Here's a question for Dr. Gupta.
Asked by Erin, Liverpool, New York
"It seems that every time I end up experiencing a bad sinus headache, it's a result of the cold weather. Is there any relationship between the weather and our health?"
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Hi guys, my name is Amelle and I'm 28 years old. I work in a snack bar. I live alone and I'm very naughty. I just want to meet a guy for a one night stand because I love having sex without any strings attached with someone I don't know. I love trying new, naughty positions in bed so I want a guy who is imaginative and experienced. I want a guy who's pretty hot and, most importantly, has a really nice tool to give me lots of sensations since I'm quite the slutty one. I know how to handle my conquests to tease them. We can have a date in an unusual place for this future hookup. I am also available in the early afternoon and during the week. So, I'm eager to discover your messages. I can't wait to have a steamy night with you. I think we're going to have a lot of fun during this naughty rendezvous. Great job! Big kisses.
Intense night in Paradise for a beautiful mature single woman
Phoebe Cates Paradise
First name: Souhela, Age: 49 yo, City: Paradise (CA)
Hi there, my name is Souhela and I'm a hot separated cougar who lives Paradise. I just turned 49. I love a night of fucking with a younger guy. I am a very beautiful cougar and that is why I am writing this hot ad. Since I'm a cougar, I only want to date guys who are younger than me. I want to make it clear that I'm looking for a hot one-night stand, not a relationship. I just want to meet someone for a hookup because I like to have uninhibited sex with strangers. I like to experiment with different kinds of foreplay, so I want a partner who is experienced in that area. I give rendezvous at the beginning of the week but preferably in the morning. It is possible to meet up where you decide but in the vicinity of Paradise. If you want to play along, write me. I hope I was understood and that you can charm me. See you soon.
Illegitimate couple on Paradise for a naughty night
Phoebe Cates Paradise
First name: Taissir, Age: 31 yo, City: Paradise (CA)
I don't have any physical criteria because it's only for a one night stand... But I want a real man who can deliver, my husband needs to see another man make me orgasm. We are fans of exhibitionism. I'm a pretty naughty girl, I enjoy sleeping with several guys including my boyfriend. You can have a meeting at our apartment but if you prefer we can move to Paradise and its surroundings. We are free mainly in the evening for this trio. We'll be playing together soon. Kisses.
An old woman who is lacking in sex needs a man tonight on Paradise
Phoebe Cates Paradise
First name: Orlande, Age: 50 yo, City: Paradise (CA)
In order to find each other, we can go to my apartment or a club. I am free during the week, I'm not contrary. I love revealing myself in the woods and having my picture taken. What really turns me on are the unexpected spankings in public places (parking lots, bathrooms, etc.), it's up to you to be innovative in the streets of Paradise. As I am a cougar, I prefer to find only with a boy younger than me. I want to have some fun in a hot encounter for a few hours. I just want to have a good time with a cool guy. If you please, let me know. I would be happy to give you my email or phone number so we can talk. See you soon.
Paradise's sexy announcement: Mature slut who cheats on her husband wants a quick fuck
Phoebe Cates Paradise
First name: Axelle, Age: 37 yo, City: Paradise (CA)
It is better to meet in the evening. Tell me when it's possible to see each other. I am available every day. I'm looking for a boy who is younger than me. Otherwise, I don't have many physical criteria. What attracts me is a man who knows how to please a woman in bed, so that I can scream with pleasure during our future night together. I love cunnilingus because it makes me orgasm a lot. I need someone who is good at licking my pussy. I love taking your cock in my mouth and I'm very experienced. However, I want to be taken savagely because I prefer the very hot pigs well endowed. I am a libertine who is looking to moan. I hope to have a lover soon who can play all my naughty games with me. I'm looking forward to your replies. I can't wait to see you again. I miss you. See you soon.
I'm a young nymphomaniac woman in Paradise who's available for some hot fun
Phoebe Cates Paradise
First name: Richelle, Age: 31 yo, City: Paradise (CA)
I love getting fucked for hours and hours. I am alone and live a totally naughty life. I don't hide from my close friends that I often have relationships with people that I don't really know. I'm sort of a sex expert. I prefer to schedule my appointments at the end of the week and towards the end of the day. We can meet wherever you want but near Paradise. Since I am new to libertinism, I require a man who is experienced and knows how to proceed. I want to let you take control during this fuck session and be your object so that you can have your way with me and get off. In order to satisfy me sexually, you will not be a novice. If you respond to my requests, you will be tired.
Beautiful married slut on Paradise for a night of outdoor exhibitionism
Phoebe Cates Paradise
First name: Jeromia, Age: 35 yo, City: Paradise (CA)
We would like to offer you an appointment at our place and rather in the evening if that's okay with you. If you write a sex ad, it's to play with a man during an evening of untamed fucking. I'm a hot chick who's good at making dicks grow. We are fans of swinging. As I am quite a naughty girl, I love fucking other guys as well as my boyfriend. So to contact us, you have to leave a little note. We only want sex between amateurs of pleasure.
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Today in the News: Obama nominates Sylvia Mathews Burwell to head HHS
News to know
President Barack Obama today said he will nominate Sylvia Mathews Burwell to replace Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. Burwell, 48, currently leads the White House budget office and is a familiar face to politicians, as she played a role in last year's budget crisis.
Quote of note
"I went outside, and everything was in flames already. There were a couple of explosions after that." - Luis Lopez, who lives near where a fiery FedEx-bus crash took place in Northern California, according to CNN. Ten people were killed, including five youths. The FedEx truck crossed onto the wrong side of a freeway and hit the bus, officials said, but the reason for the accident remains unclear.
Hot video
Pope Francis asks for forgiveness for sex abuse by priests.
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The Forsyth County Board of Commissioners enacted a comprehensive Animal Services ordinance on November 8, 1999. This innovative and progressive ordinance--praised by regional and national animal-care and service organizations--was designed to improve public safety, prevent animal bites, and provide greater protection for animals in Forsyth County. Residents of the county who own animals should be aware of the major components of the ordinance. In October of 2016 section 6.6 regarding tethering of animals was amended to ban this practice with very limited exceptions. Anyone who is experiencing an animal related problem or who would like more information about the ordinance should call the animal shelter at 703-2490.
To view the complete Animal Services Ordinance, go to Forsyth County Code and select Chapter 6 from the left panel.
Para ver la Ordenanza de service de Animales completa, presione aquí!
BE IT ORDAINED by the Board of Commissioners of Forsyth County that Chapter 6 of the Forsyth County Code is hereby amended to read as follows:
That section 6-6 of the Forsyth County Code is hereby amended by replacing section 6-6(d) with the following, so as amended, to read:
(d) Tethering. It shall be unlawful for any person to restrain a dog using a chain, wire or other
type of tethering device in a manner prohibited by this subsection.
1. No person shall tether, fasten, chain, tie, or restrain a dog, or cause such restraining of a dog, to a tree, fence, post, dog house, or other stationary object. During periods of tethering that are not unlawful under this subsection, any tethering device used shall be at least ten feet in length and attached in such a manner as to prevent strangulation or other injury to the dog or entanglement with objects.
2. No person shall tether, fasten, chain, tie, or restrain a dog, or cause such restraining of a dog, to a cable trolley system, that allows movement of the restraining device. During periods of tethering that are not unlawful under this subsection, the length of the cable along which the tethering device can move must be at least ten feet, and the tethering device must be of such length that the dog is able to move ten feet away from the cable perpendicularly and attached in such a manner as to prevent strangulation or other injury to the dog and entanglement with objects. During periods of lawful tethering under this subsection, tethers must be made of rope, twine, cord, or similar material with a swivel on one end or must be made of a chain that is at least ten feet in length with swivels on both ends and which does not exceed ten percent of the dog's body weight. All collars or harnesses used for the purpose of the lawful tethering of a dog must be made of nylon or leather.
3. No person shall tether a dog with a chain or wire or other device to, or cause such attachment to, any collar other than a buckle type collar or body harness.
4. No person shall tether with a chain or a wire or other device to, or cause such attachment to, a head harness, choke-chain type collar or spiked/pointed studded/pronged collar to a dog.
The Animal Services director has the authority to instruct an animal owner to confine an animal if it has been damaging or soiling the property of others, turning over garbage, impeding the safety of pedestrians, bicyclists or motorists, or creating a nuisance in any other way.
|Duplicate Tag
|Late Fee
|Unfertile (Sterilized)
|Fertile (Unsterilized)
|Dangerous Dogs
Animal owners must keep their animals on their property or under restraint by a competent person at all times. Hunting dogs are excluded from these regulations as long as the dogs are hunting legally and not trespassing.
Leash Laws
The City of Winston-Salem and the incorporated towns within Forsyth County have enacted local leash laws that are enforced by the Department of Animal Services. These laws require that dogs must be leashed when visiting any public park.
Animal owners must not allow their animals to bite a human being. "Bite" includes oral contact that scratches or breaks the skin. Animals that bite may be impounded and preventive measures may be required of their owners (see below). Because un-neutered animals are most likely to bite, owners are encouraged to have their animals spayed or neutered. Spaying or neutering not only helps reduce the number of animal bites but also helps to reduce the number of unwanted animals that are brought to the animal shelter each year.
The Animal Services department can require fence installation and repair and other confinement measures when these are deemed necessary in order to prevent animal bites. The department can impose these "preventive measures" after considering factors such as the animal's behavior, temperament and size, whether there are children in the area under the age of thirteen (13), and the safety of residents in the immediate area. The department also has the authority to require an animal's owner to obtain liability insurance for the benefit of any person who may be injured by the animal. Animal Services can terminate ownership rights in severe cases, and owners do not have any recourse to a hearing or appeal. (The preventive measures program replaced the dangerous dog program formerly managed by the health department.)
Proper Shelter Defined
Animals kept outside must have a shelter that includes three sides, a roof and a floor (barns are excluded from this last requirement). Outside shelters must be structurally sound as well as wind and water resistant.
Dogs, cats and other pets must be vaccinated against rabies at three (3) months of age and must receive rabies booster shots as required. Dogs must wear a current rabies tag on a collar or harness. Failure to have both tags on a dog's collar could result in costly penalties. Cats are not required to wear a rabies tag but their owners must be able to provide written proof of vaccination.
Every animal that has bitten a person shall be confined for ten (10) days at the direction of the Animal Services department and at the expense of the animal's owner. Failure to report an animal bite or the whereabouts of an animal that has bitten is unlawful.
Any animal that appears lost, strayed or abandoned, that is found not wearing a valid tax tag and current rabies tag, or is found running at large, shall be impounded by the Animal Services department. Animals may also be brought to the shelter by a concerned citizen. Depending on the circumstances, the animal's owner may be subject to fines and penalties, which increase with each new offense.
The owner of an impounded animal may redeem the animal within five (5) days of impoundment by paying all fees and penalties due. Failure to reclaim an animal does not relieve the animal's owner from paying all applicable fees and penalties.
Every dog and cat reclaimed by its owner will be microchipped prior to its release. All animals adopted from Forsyth County Animal Services are also microchipped before going to their new homes. A microchip is a tiny, passive electronic device implanted under an animal's skin that serves a permanent identification marker. If a microchipped animal is brought to the shelter, identifying that animal is easier than identifying one that has not been microchipped.
The person or business engaged in aggression training of dogs must register the dog with the department of Animal Services. Guard or aggression-trained dogs must wear a guard-dog tag.
No person or business may possess, harbor or have an inherently dangerous exotic animal or wild animal. Exemptions to this rule include lawfully operated pet shops, zoos, veterinarians, wildlife rehabilitators with proper permits and scientific research facilities.
|First Offense
|$50 and microchip
|Second Offense
|$75 and microchip
|Third Offense
|$150 and microchip and animal must be spayed or neutered and a secure enclosure must be provided for the animal
|Fourth Offense
|$200 and microchip and animal must be spayed or neutered and a secure enclosure must be provided for the animal
|$500 and seizure
|Failure to comply with a written order
|Violations accumulate per owner, not per animal.
Criminal Penalties. Persons violating this ordinance shall be guilty of a class three (3) misdemeanor and shall be fined not more than $500.
Civil Penalties. Persons who violate this chapter shall be subject to a civil penalty for each violation in the amount established by the board of county commissioners.
Citations. The Animal Services department is authorized to issue written citations to violators of this chapter. The penalty must be paid within 72 hours. No impounded animal may be redeemed until all penalties are paid in full.
The material presented on this page is intended as a summary of the Animal Services ordinance and is provided for educational purposes only. Anyone with a specific legal question should consult the full text of the ordinance.
FHS University North (FCAS) Adoption Hours:


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May 13th, 2012
Moms make the toughest patients
Anthony Youn, M.D., is a plastic surgeon in metro Detroit. He is the author of "In Stitches," a humorous memoir about growing up Asian American and becoming a doctor.
I've always taken my mom for granted. A lot of us do.
I never realized just how strong and selfless she is.
Then tragedy struck.
In many ways, my mother is the stereotypical Asian mom. Forty-five years ago she immigrated to the United States with my father, a physician. A classic homemaker, she spent her days raising my brother, sister, and me. In the evenings, after my dad returned home for work, she would take care of him.
Several years ago I received a call from my father. My mom had exercised in the early evening and then began to feel short of breath. My dad rushed her to the emergency room. By the time they got there, she could hardly breathe.
The doctors diagnosed her with sudden onset heart failure - one of the valves of her heart had stopped functioning, causing a backup of fluid into her lungs.
My mom was literally drowning from the inside out.
I rushed to the hospital that evening and saw her. She was awake but struggling to breathe. Upon seeing me, she smiled.
"Oh, Tony, you shouldn't have come here. You're so busy with residency. Go home and get some rest," she said, waving me off.
I spent the next several hours by her side. The next day, she was scheduled to undergo open heart surgery to repair her faulty valve.
In the moments before her operation, my brother, sister, father, and I stood next to her gurney. I smiled at her through teary eyes. My mom, seeing our concern, tried to reassure us.
"I'll be fine. I'm in God's hands now. Go eat some breakfast. You're probably all so hungry!"
After several moments of silence and small talk, she was wheeled into the OR.
The operation was a success.
After surgery my mother was transferred to the Cardiac Intensive Care Unit, while still on the ventilator. We went to visit her.
"She's doing great," her nurse told us. "She's a real trooper. Most patients don't tolerate having a breathing tube down their throat while awake. But your mom is handling it like a pro."
The nurse was right. Even with the breathing tube in, my mother looked calm and peaceful. We all walked up to her.
"Mom," I said softly. She opened her eyes. "Are you ok?"
She nodded.
"Make sure you stay still and don't pull out your breathing tube. It's important to keep it in place until you're ready to breathe on your own."
She nodded again and smiled at me.
As a surgeon, I've taken care of hundreds of patients on ventilators. The majority of them need large amounts of sedatives to prevent them from pulling out their breathing tube. It's an incredibly uncomfortable feeling to have this tube extending down your throat.
Yet my mom handled it better than any patient I've ever seen.
Do you know who the toughest patients are? Ask any doctor or nurse. It's not construction workers. Not tattooed bikers. Not even professional athletes.
It's moms.
Moms go through more physical and emotional pain than most men can imagine. As a father, I now understand the connection between a mother and her child. It's stronger than just about anything else in the world.
I am thankful for the doctors who saved my mom's life. I am thankful for the hospital staff who cared for her. But most of all, I'm thankful for my mom.
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About this blog
Get a behind-the-scenes look at the latest stories from CNN Chief Medical Correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, Senior Medical Correspondent Elizabeth Cohen and the CNN Medical Unit producers. They'll share news and views on health and medical trends - info that will help you take better care of yourself and the people you love.


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CNN's Ted Rowlands takes you on a ride along with two 26-year veteran Chicago police officers to document what happens nightly in the deadly neighborhood of Englewood.
And watch Ted's night in the ER
Post by: Ted Rowlands
Filed under: Anderson Cooper • Chicago Killings • Crime • Ted Rowlands
CNN never mentions that there's a gun ban in Chicago.
It's true there are pockets where the violence is REALLY bad, but it's not at all true that it's then "the rest of Chicago" ... That's actually the problem. Historically it has always been just pockets that are bad, but now those pockets have expanded and into more and more working class neighborhoods, throughout the entire city (and alarming to many is "the north side"). Avondale is a terrific example of a neighborhood that 8 years or so ago was a family neighborhood, now it's overrun with gang violence and people are being randomly shot at left and right.
Anderson Cooper goes beyond the headlines to tell stories from many points of view, so you can make up your own mind about the news. Tune in weeknights at 8 and 10 ET on CNN.
Questions or comments? Send an email
Want to know more? Go behind the scenes with AC361°


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Fox Picks Up New Reality Show Utopia
Fox hopes to break network TV's recent reality TV drought with Utopia, a new show from Big Brother creator John de Mol.
Like Big Brother, Utopia follows the interaction between strangers as they're thrust together - this time to form a new society. The show premiered earlier this month in Holland, where it was SBS 6's top-rated unscripted series premiere in six years. Utopia continued as the No. 1 series in its Monday through Friday time period for 10 consecutive nights.
Utopia immediately became a hot commodity in the U.S., where Fox just won the bidding rights. Utopia will become the first major new reality show on Fox under the oversight of the network's new head of alternative series, Simon Andreae.
"Utopia will be the largest, most ambitious social experiment on television, and I'm thrilled that Talpa Media USA has chosen Fox as its U.S. broadcast partner," Andreae says. "The series offers people from all walks of life the chance to start all over again and re-write the rules of civilization as we know it. It addresses fascinating and fundamental questions about human law, morality and social structures, wrapped in an irresistible and truly forward-thinking television format."
De Mol's Talpa Media is behind Utopia, which follows 15 contestants as the create an ideal community. The inhabitants leave their lives behind to move into an empty structure, along with limited amenities. Players are eliminated by others, as well as by viewers. An online 24-hour video stream will also be available, much like the one for Big Brother.
"Fox's speed and passion for the project, combined with its pioneering reputation in the unscripted field, make it the perfect home for this unique proposition," says de Mol. "The key questions Utopia asks are 'Are people able to create an ideal society from scratch? And will it be ultimate happiness or complete chaos?' What makes this even more interesting to watch, both on television and online, is the question that viewers undoubtedly will ask themselves, 'What would I do?'"
Subscribe to TV Guide Magazine now!
View original Fox Picks Up New Reality Show Utopia at TVGuide.com
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Canadian Flag 1-3/8" X 7/8" (Sheets of 25)
|Original Price
|Discounted Price
America's Toughest Decals
Healy Awards is the your one-stop shop for quality products including easy to apply Football Helmet Decals. Our 20 mil vinyl makes our decals America's most durable to last you an entire season. With our amazing graphics department, your helmets can look the best on and off the field. We've been producing Football Decals for over 50 years to High Schools, Colleges, Universities, Semi-Pro teams and Youth Leagues all over the country. We can ship your decals out quickly to meet your game dates while maintaining the best quality football helmet decal. Don't be fooled by other companies that use a thinner material. Make sure your helmet decals will last all season long.
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In addition to the vast amount of standard colors we carry, you can choose to add more pop to your helmets. We offer different color and material options including Metallic Flake, Chrome and Matte Finish. Feel free to request color swatches from our outstanding Customer Service Department to ensure you get the closest color to your uniforms. Whether you have matte finish helmets or glossy, our decals will adhere all season long and still come off at the end of the season with ease.
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Once the artwork is approved and payment is received, your decals will typically ship within 3-5 business days. Rush orders are available should you need them sooner. Please contact Customer Service to discuss rush options available.


text: Celebrity Nick Cannon Breaks Down the Inspiration Behind New Single 'Hold On' By People Staff Published on February 16, 2017 10:48 AM Share Tweet Pin Email Hold On is our Toyota People Pick Of The Day Come back every day at 8:30 a.m. EST to watch People Now streaming live from Time Inc. headquarters in New York City, and rebroadcast at 11:30 am EST. Get the absolute latest in celebrity news, real-life people stories & the best of fashion and food. Want even more? Watch clips from yesterday's People Now.


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Issue 75 October 19, 2012 | Focus on Waste Pickers
This week's issue contains reports, videos and blog posts that discuss the health, environmental and other issues that affect waste pickers. According to the Global Alliance of Waste Pickers, the term "waste pickers" can be broadly defined as people who reclaim reusable and recyclable materials from what others have cast aside as waste.
In many countries, family-based enterprises in the solid waste informal sector account for most recycling of metal, paper, plastic, glass, and kitchen and garden waste. Without the activity of these micro-entrepreneurs, much more waste would end up in dumps or in the environment, but at the same time their conditions of work are difficult and unhealthy.
Please let WASHplus know at any time if you have resources to share for future issues of WASHplus Weekly or if you have suggestions for future topics. An archive of past Weekly issues is available on the WASHplus website.


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After delivering a speedy $1.05 billion verdict against Samsung on Friday, the nine Apple v. Samsung jurors were escorted out a rear exit by court staff, leaving the throng of waiting reporters with no information on how the verdict was reached.
Now we know at least part of the answer. The nine-person panel believed that Samsung had taken a "calculated risk," and they believed that Samsung "knew or should have known what they were doing was infringing," jury foreman Velvin Hogan said in an interview today with his hometown newspaper, the San Jose Mercury-News.
Some of the most influential evidence in the jury's eyes included internal Samsung e-mails like the one from a designer describing the difference between the iPhone's user interface and a Samsung phone as the "difference between Heaven and Earth," as well as competitive intelligence documents where Samsung analyzed differences between its own phones and the iPhone. Also swinging the vote Apple's way was the fact that Google warned Samsung that some of its products looked too similar to Apple products.
Despite the fact that the verdict came just two and a half days after closing arguments, Hogan insisted the jurors were thorough and methodical in their deliberations. "We didn't whiz through this," he said. "We took it very seriously."
Hogan, a 67-year-old electrical engineer who lives in San Jose, said he was influenced in part by his own experience acquiring a patent. By the end of the first day of deliberations, he said he decided that Samsung's prior art arguments didn't hold up.
"I was thinking about the patents, and thought, 'If this were my patent, could I defend it?'" Hogan recalled. "Once I answered that question as yes, it changed how I looked at things."
The jury "wanted to send a message to the industry at large that patent infringing is not the right thing to do, not just Samsung," Hogan told the newspaper. "We felt like we were 100 percent fair, but we wanted something more than a slap on the wrist."
Another juror, Manuel Ilagan, confirmed to CNET that Hogan's influence on the jury was significant. "He had experience," said Ilagan. "He owned patents himself... so he took us through his experience. After that it was easier."


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Rab De Bana Di Jodi – movie review
This two hour forty-five minute movie is light, frothy, and enjoyable, even though the story is unbelievable. The concept behind the story is a good one. It's about seeing through superficial appearances to the real person within. It's about an ordinary man called Surinder Singh (Shah Rukh Khan), an introvert, and somewhat repressed, who falls headlong in love with a pretty young girl. Even after marriage he is unable to express his love for her. Not only is he quiet and undemonstrative, his appearance, dress sense and his hesitant demeanour is uninspiring and one is reminded of Clark Kent in Superman. His new bride, Taani (Anushka Sharma), finds him dull and boring, and is unable to love him. The movie is about their love, about how Suri sets about to woo her after their marriage and we wonder whether Taani will eventually see through Suri's boring exterior to the real Suri.
The director, Aditya Chopra, a man who made the stupendously successful Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge, tells this story in a fairly theatrical manner, by creating a situation where it is possible for Suri to dress up and act like another person and meet his wife in a different situation. No, not as superman, but simply the young dashing sort, much like the hero Raj of Yash Raj films – flamboyant, cheerful, talkative and an incorrigible flirt. Thankfully, Taani finds this "flirting" offensive. Any girl would, married or not.
The story
The story is fairly predictable and it is a kind of fantasy as well, despite it being devoid of foreign locations. Otherwise why should the staid and restrained Suri suddenly break into a song? Why is Taani unable to recognize him in his double role? She doesn't even say, hey you look a little like my husband! And why would Taani, a small-town home-bound girl behave in the remarkably liberal manner that she does?
There is a premise of the story I did not agree with. In one of the most serious scenes in the movie Raj asks Taani what girls want in their men and she says all that a girl wants is for a man to love her to distraction, and what Taani appreciates in Suri is that he loves her even though she doesn't reciprocate one bit. I found this premise a superficial one. Perhaps this explains why some young men pursue women relentlessly even when the women are not interested, in the hope that one day they will be.
The music
The song Haule Haule is a good one and while the rest of the music is average, the choreography by Shiamak Davar is good. All the songs are picturised well.
The characters
Once in the skin of Raj, Suri's character seems to change, much in the manner of Jekyll and Hyde. Shah Rukh's rather dramatic acting distinctly sets apart both Raj and Suri. Overall though Shah Rukh does a good job, playing both roles with his usual flair and intensity. Except for the character of Suri, the others are poorly developed. Raj's character is a paper cut-out and Vinay Pathak's character Bobby is exaggerated, like Raj's. However Pathak acts well, as usual. Taani's character seems out of sync, on one hand she is a traditional girl who likes to do her "duty" by her husband, and on the other she is willing to break all societal norms and actually not go through much conflict, not until the very end! At least if the director had shown some disturbance in her mind it would have been more believable. Sharma acted quite alright though, considering the basic weaknesses in her scripted character.
Overall this movie is light entertainment and even if it drags in the middle, it is a must watch for Shah Rukh fans. He does an great job playing two characters and there are a lot of funny moments in the movie, and well, it is a romantic comedy. But if you have to compare this movie to other romantic movies, it is not as good as Jab we met and certainly nowhere in the class of Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge.
(Photo from sify.com)
Related Reading: Ghajini Review
Other movie reviews
Vinod permalinkDecember 13, 2008 11:21 am
Thank you for the review.
Thankfully, Taani finds this "flirting" offensive.
Why would you take that so personally? 🙂
Didn't realise I was being personal! 🙂 I guess my view is that the kind of "wooing" that is shown in many films is offensive to women. In real life such "wooing" is usually not liked by women. You know, the street romeo kind. That's what I meant. – Nita.
December 13, 2008 11:38 am
After reading your review, I am not too sure whether now I want to watch it or not.
1. I am not a SRK fan
2. I am not too fond of romantic comedies unless the humor is very good. Jab we met also was fine through the first half alone.
That is usually what I like to do with my reviews. Allow space for readers to decide for themselves, either way. 🙂 I like SRK though can't say I am crazy about him! – Nita.
December 13, 2008 11:56 am
The review makes me feel heartbroken..I just read a similar review in timesofindia..I am a die hard fan of SRK and I expect great movies from him..Nevermind,I have lot of time in hand and will watch the movie even if its boring 😉
SRK does a decent job in this movie Nimmy, even if the movie is not that good from the critics point of view. I think if you like SRK you will like this movie. And you won't be disappointed in him, because he is not the director. I am certainly disappointed in Aditya Chopra! – Nita.
gauri permalinkDecember 14, 2008 12:16 am
Nita – do you write reviews about the movies you (want to/happen to) watch, or do you watch movies – as a part of your profession, or otherwise – so you could write reviews?
If it's the latter: 1) how do you manage to sit through a crappy movie and 2) bring yourself to write a neutral review?
Slapstick or overdone humor, for instance – not everyone subscribes to that idea of 'funny', but there still are a lot of takers. Or an utterly useless, pointless movie to some could be a light, fun movie to others. It's not something objective like cinematography or special effects, where you can say "wonderfully done" and be right.
I don't know if my comment has much to do with this post in particular, but this is something I have been curious about.
Granted, that a review is an opinion piece in itself, but it still must be difficult to keep the potential audience intrigued, and confirm their intuition about (not) wanting to watch the movie. See what I'm trying to say?
Vinod permalinkDecember 14, 2008 8:47 am
Nita, I ought to have mentioned this before – your honesty is beautiful.
gauri permalinkDecember 14, 2008 10:24 pm
Aha! Nicely said, straight from the heart. Thanks for taking the time to explain.
I actually loved Sajjanpur – I didn't know it was critically acclaimed or anything – just saw it in the Indian store, read the synopsis. I found it a blend of Ruskin Bond and Malgudi days, and both are very close to my heart. But yes, there are some arty for the sake of being (f)arty movies. Mindless humor too, Andaaz Apna Apna/Bheja Fry – good; Laxmikant Berde/Ashok Saraf combi – noisy and headachy.
Honest reviews are the most appreciated – did I tell you, I would never have ventured to watch Dostana, but after I read your review, I went ahead and saw it with zero (if not minus 3) baseline expectation. And what do you know, I simply had a good time when I came out of the theater! You told it like it was, and I was not disappointed!! 🙂 Thanks for that!
Keep them coming…
December 15, 2008 7:03 am
I was throughly amazed with experiment Yash Raj did in this movie.
Things which were more noticeable were:
1. Over acting in terms of character of Raj.
2. Yellow color usage.
The movie seemed to be dry, and overall acting intense. It lacked punch lines.
Only SRK and this some acting talent made people sit till last minute.
January 12, 2009 6:25 pm
There were so many things I wanted to comment on as I read through all of this, from the original post, to many of the comments, but I suppose it's kind-of irrelevant now. [ 1 month in film world is practically an age, old hat, dead duck, history 😛 ].
What I will say is, considering this is my first read of your work, is that I like your writing style. You've covered here that you enjoyed it, despite its flaws, spelling them out in a manner such that readers can pick away at whether they 'could' forgive the flaws or not.
I always find rating difficult, I do tweet an out of 5 score, but as you said below it's quite a varied thing depending on factors:
"for srk fans? Its 5 stars! 😀 for non srk fans – 1 star!"
on my blog, I kinda took the cop-out option of traffic lights. if unsure, there's always 'amber' to fall on. it works for filtering out the must-watch greens & no-go reds but i'm still keeping an eye open for a better rating system.
okay I seem to have sidelined ..
back on track ..
i might add, i don't agree with your scores.. i'd say 3.5 if you can forgive the plot flaws & take it for what it intends to be {fluff and fantasy}, 4.0 for those that fit the above & are SRK fans, though that's most SRK fans I think (certainly including myself)
anyway ..
nice to be here .. consider me subscribed 🙂
Ramjaane, thanks and welcome here. And where movies are concerned, I try hard to give both the pros and cons but also state whether I enjoyed it or not! That is my own personal style of writing movie reviews. As for having a different rating for the movie, ofcourse! Each individual will have his/her own scores. – Nita


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Jamilla Dress, Black
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Wonderful item thank you
|Dimensions (mm)
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|Ring Size
In this colorful variety of fire opals, the luminous opal is fused with the surrounding host rock, the matrix, which often consists of reddish-brown ryolite (magmatic stone). Against the backdrop of the inconspicuous host rock, the whole splendor of the Fire Opal stratum unfolds. Their mostly fire-red to orange-yellow basic color reminds us of the glowing volcanoes in which the Mexican fire opals once formed. However, a fire opal matrix can sometimes appear almost transparent, giving us the impression of looking at the bottom of a clear lake through opalescent rainbow colors. Depending on the incidence of light, there is always a different picture. The infinite variety of formations can show shimmering miniature landscapes and magical images that cast a spell over our history. There are no limits to the fantasy of viewing a Fire Opal matrix. Therefore, this opal variety is also considered a symbol of cheerfulness and joy of life and is particularly popular with artists and creative people.
100% Guarantee: Customer satisfaction is guaranteed, I offer a no hassle return. If you are not satisfied for any reason, just send back (same condition )the item(s) within 7 days after you received it. Upon I check the items carefully. A refund minus shipping will be given inmediately.
Wonderful item thank you
Fantastic thank you
Love this design, beautiful Opal!
The piece was even more beautiful in person.
Paid and shipped - no feedback left after 100 days
was supposed to be sent a LONG time ago and not only has it not been sent, or have i gotten a refund, but the senders are ignoring me and refusing to respond. stole 45 bucks from me. do not trust
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Morning Jolt: 3-year-old in wheelchair patted down by TSA
In the news
A 3-year-old girl who has Spina bifida was subjected to a patdown and had her beloved stuffed animal taken away from her by TSA agents, according to news reports. The father of the girl said agents told them they were singling her out because she uses a wheelchair. But not only did TSA agents check her wheelchair, they took the girl's stuffed animal away, causing her to cry, and patted her down (reports say the girl has part of her spinal cord exposed on her back as well). The mother recorded the incident and posted it to YouTube. Agents tried to tell her it was illegal to record them, but her attorney husband knew otherwise.
Happening today
It's Oscar weekend, and two new movies are opening in wide release ahead of the festivities: "Snitch," a PG-13 action movie starring Dwayne Johnson; and "Dark Skies," a PG-13 horror flick.
Opening bell
The Dow Jones opened at 13,880.62 after finishing down 46.92 points Thursday.
Motivational quote
"Few things can help an individual more than to place responsibility on him, and to let him know that you trust him." - Booker T. Washington
Watercooler talk: 'Harlem Shake' tops Billboard chart thanks to YouTube
Viral music videos now impact the Billboard Hot 100. Baauer's "Harlem Shake" debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 this week, due in large to the amount of YouTube videos uploaded by fans. Billboard recently changed its format to include YouTube hits to determine the ranking of their charts. Gillian Pensavalle has the details.
GateHouse News Service


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In the latest edition of New York Magazine, Clive Thompson has a fascinating article, "Why New Yorkers Last Longer." Below we have excerpted portions of the article which includes several situational explanations — from "smart public policy and sheer luck" to "the very structure of the city."
* * *
Last winter, the New York City Department of Health released figures that told a surprising story: New Yorkers are living longer than ever, and longer than most people in the country. A New Yorker born in 2004 can now expect to live 78.6 years, nine months longer than the average American will. What's more, our life expectancy is increasing at a rate faster than that of most of the rest of the country. . . . When these figures came out, urban-health experts were impressed and slightly dazed. It turns out the conventional wisdom is wrong: The city, it seems, won't kill you. Quite the opposite. Not only are we the safest big city in America, but we are, by this measure at least, the healthiest.
The "average life expectancy" of a city is a statistically curious number. It's not really a prediction about how long you're going to live. It's an average of how long everyone here lives—and thus it forms a good barometer of the overall health of the city. . . .
And this is precisely what the city has done, through a combination of smart public policy and sheer luck. All the boons of the nineties—the aggressive policing, the dramatic drop in crime, the renaissance of the city's parks and street life, the freakish infusion of boom-time wealth—played a part.
* * *
Homicide, AIDS, and drugs are characteristically New York ways to die young, of course, so it's no surprise that when we sharply decreased the fatalities they caused, we caught up with the rest of the country. But here's the thing: It's not just that we've conquered these urban blights. Cancer and cardiac arrest are down, too. The number of people in the city dying from heart disease has dropped by a third in the last twenty years, and cancer rates have slid by nearly a fifth. And again in these cases, New York is getting healthier faster than the rest of the U.S.
In essence, there is a health gap emerging between our massive metropolis and the rest of the country—some X factor that's improving our health in subtle, everyday ways. . . . Like many New Yorkers, I'd moved here with some trepidation—always figuring that the stress, pollution, and 60-hour workweeks would knock about five years off my life. I was wrong—precisely wrong. But where, exactly, is our excess life coming from?
I take this question to Thomas Frieden, New York's commissioner of public health. Frieden is a wonk's wonk—a handsome, energetic doctor who has gained a nationwide reputation for his aggressive effort to push New York's average-life-expectancy figure ever higher. The smoking ban of 2003? The trans-fat ban of last year? You can thank Frieden for both. . . .
But even Frieden admits that public policy can't account for all the gains. When I ask what the X factor is—where the "excess life" is coming from—Frieden goes over to his desk and returns with a clear plastic statuette. It's from the American Podiatric Medical Association and Prevention magazine: BEST WALKING CITY, 2006.
"We've won it a couple of years in a row," he tells me with a grin. He's got a bunch of them kicking around.
Walking? This isn't quite as facile an explanation as it sounds. Scientists who study urban health argue that it's not just that we walk more—it's the way we walk that has a surprising spillover effect on life spans. . . . Eleanor Simonsick, a Baltimore-based epidemiologist, knew that regular walking is a powerful way to maintain your health. But she began to wonder, a question very germane to us in New York: Does the speed at which you walk also affect your health?
She decided to conduct an experiment to find out. She and a group of scientists assembled 3,075 seniors in their seventies and asked them to traverse a 400-meter course, walking as fast as they could. They monitored their subjects' health over the next six years, during which time 430 of the geriatrics died and many more fell ill. When Simonsick crunched the data, she found that the ones who were dying and getting sick were the ones who walked the slowest. For every minute longer it took someone to complete the 400-meter walk, he had a 29 percent higher chance of mortality and a 52 percent greater chance of being disabled. People who walk faster live longer—and enjoy better health in their later years.
"Walking speed absolutely reflects health status," Simonsick says. . . .
The thing is, as Simonsick points out, New York is literally designed to force people to walk, to climb stairs—and to do it quickly. Driving in the city is maddening, pushing us onto the sidewalks and up and down the stairs to the subways. What's more, our social contract dictates that you should move your ass when you're on the sidewalk, so as not to annoy your fellow walkers. (A recent ranking of cities found that New York has the fastest pedestrians in the country.) As Simonsick sees it, the very structure of the city coerces us to exercise far more than people elsewhere in the U.S., in a way that is strongly correlated with a far-better life expectancy. Every city block doubles as a racewalking track, every subway station, a StairMaster. Seen this way, the whole city looks like a massive exercise machine dedicated to improving our health while we run errands.
This idea of the city as a health club is fairly revolutionary. Back in the beginning of the industrial revolution, cities were regarded, quite correctly, as lethal places to live. . . . In the first decades of the twentieth century, cities began to clean up their acts drastically, when sanitation standards emerged and inoculations began to aggressively squelch infectious diseases; the actual life spans in cities began to catch up to and exceed those of people in rural areas. But the idea of urban rot remained strong, so the cultural bias against urban life lived on. It didn't help when the seventies and eighties ushered in waves of urban crime, recession, and drug epidemics, and cities like New York and Detroit and Chicago sharply curtailed public-health services. Cities, more than ever, seemed like cesspools of dread and early death.
By 2000, though, the perspective looked altogether different. With a sharply reduced crime rate, runaway gentrification, and a geyser of boom-time dough, Manhattan had largely conquered the homicide, AIDS, and overdose problems that were pulling down the average life-expectancy figure. A trio of New York–based urban-health academics—Nicholas Freudenberg, David Vlahov, and Sandro Galea, professors at Hunter College and the New York Academy of Medicine—began to wonder if the "urban health penalty" still made sense. As they examined the most recent data about health in cities versus health in rural and suburban areas, they noticed that the cities were, contrary to theory, pulling ahead. . . . Death rates for 1-to-24-year-old males are 60 per 100,000 in cities, versus 80 in rural areas. Perhaps worst of all for the suburbs, obesity is rising far more rapidly than in cities.
"We were just walking around New York and thinking, Wait a minute," Vlahov says. "People in New York are in better shape than ever. So there's obviously got to be something about cities that's good for you."
The urban health penalty, they decided, had inverted itself. The new reality was that living in the suburbs and the country was the killer. In January 2005, Vlahov and his colleagues penned a manifesto they cleverly called "The Urban Health 'Advantage,' " and published it in the Journal of Urban Health. Cities, they posited, were now the healthiest places of all, because their environment conferred subtle advantages—and guided its citizens, often quite unconsciously, to adopt healthier behaviors.
Three years ago, Lawrence Frank, a professor of urban planning at the University of British Columbia, set out to measure this effect, examining 10,858 people in Atlanta and the type of neighborhood they lived in. . . . When he checked the results, the health difference was shockingly large: A white man who lived in a more urban, mixed-use area was fully ten pounds lighter than a demographically identical guy who lived in a sprawling suburb.
"The more you drive, the more you weigh," Frank tells me after I call him to talk about it. He was unsurprised when I described New York's increases in life expectancy. "You put people in an environment where public transportation is rational and driving is almost impossible, and it would be shocking not to see this outcome," he says. Other scientists suggest that New York's benefits do not occur merely because the city is walkable. It's also because New York is old and filled with attractive architecture and interesting street scenes—since, as it turns out, aesthetically pretty places lure people out of their homes and cars. A 2002 study by the National Institutes of Health found that people living in buildings built before 1973 were significantly more likely to walk one-mile distances than those living in areas with newer architecture—because their environments were less architecturally ugly.
At the same time, New Yorkers are also more likely to visit parks than people who live in sprawl, because the parks are closer at hand. And proximity matters, as a study by Deborah Cohen, a senior natural scientist at the rand Corporation, discovered. When she examined the use of several parks in Los Angeles, she found that almost half the people using any given park lived no more than a quarter-mile away. In contrast, only 13 percent of the people using the park had come from more than a mile away. "The farther you are, the less willing you are to go to the park," she notes.
Interestingly, urban theorists believe it is not just the tightly packed nature of the city but also its social and economic density that has life-giving properties. When you're jammed, sardinelike, up against your neighbors, it's not hard to find a community of people who support you—friends or ethnic peers—and this strongly correlates with better health and a longer life. Then there are economies of scale: A big city has bigger hospitals that can afford better equipment—the future of medicine arrives here first. We also tend to enjoy healthier food options, since demanding foodies (vegetarians and the like) are aggregated in one place, making it a mecca for farm-fresh produce and top-quality fish, chicken, and beef. There's also a richer cultural scene than in a small town, which helps keep people out and about and thus mentally stimulated.
* * *
At times, talking to Frieden and some of the other scientists, I wondered if all the talk about how healthy cities had become might be the latest species of boosterism, of civic mythmaking, partly because he's staked his legacy on such aggressive policies as bad-food bans. And urban theorists have begun a fierce beat-down on the suburbs, castigating them endlessly for being the epicenter of the obesity epidemic. As it happens, this is the argument of Matthew Turner, an economist at the University of Toronto. Last year, he decided he was a bit sick of hearing about the health benefits of cities. The "urban health advantage" sounded to him like mere self-congratulation—the skinny, attractive folks in the megalopolises crowing about their innate superiority, and recoiling at the barbarisms of the SUV-driving, Wal-Mart-shopping exurban masses. It seemed too much like blue-state snobbery. So Turner devised a new experiment to test the power of the urban health advantage.
If it's true that cities impose inherently healthier behavior on you, Turner reasoned, then people who move from cities to suburbs should get fatter—and vice versa. He began hoovering up data on 6,000 young Americans in their twenties to forties, tracking where they lived over a six-year period. He used satellite imagery and tallies of shops and churches to determine the level of sprawl in each subject's neighborhood, then gathered information on each one's weight.
When he examined the data, he discovered something surprising: People who moved between dense and sprawling neighborhoods didn't change weight. Despite the claims of the new urbanists, Turner saw no evidence that one's built environment has an impact on one's health. "This idea that the built environment affects how much you weigh," he told me, "is just wrong."
But then why do cities harbor slimmer people who live longer and healthier than those in sprawl? Because, Turner argues, the populations are self-selecting. Highly active people who don't like to drive—and who crave to make boatloads of money—naturally gravitate to places like New York, because that suits their chosen lifestyle. If we walk a lot here, it's because we're drawn to cities that force us to do so. The converse is also true: People who are heavier and less fit gravitate to suburbs precisely because that's where they won't need to walk—where nothing is possible without getting in a car. (Mind you, Turner's rival scientists are not convinced by his argument. As one pointed out to me, moving to a differently dense area might take years to change your weight—longer than Turner's time frame.) In Turner's view, the logic of the urban health advantage is not only wrong, it's backward. It's not that New York makes us healthier. We make it healthier, by flocking here to live.
Ultimately, I've come to believe that Turner is likely correct—but so are the proponents of the urban health advantage. The two theories are not mutually exclusive. A city can be good for your health and, at the same time, attract healthy people.
* * *
To review a sample Situationist posts examining the situaitonal sources of obesity, click here.


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October 26th, 2011
What's in a blood alcohol level?
The National Transportation Safety Board on Tuesday recommended the legal limit for driving drunk be lowered from .08 blood-alcohol content to .05 in an effort to reduce alcohol-related motor vehicle crashes, which kill about 10,000 people a year.
Your blood-alcohol level can vary depending on your age, weight, previous alcohol and drug experience and the type of alcohol being consumed.
"You can drink alcohol faster than you can remove it from your body and that's when your blood-alcohol level goes up," says Robert Pandina, Ph.D., and the director of the Center for Alcohol Studies at Rutgers University.
According to the Mayo Clinic, it takes the body roughly one hour to metabolize a single drink but the definition of what constitutes a drink changes depending on the alcohol. A drink is defined as 12 ounces of beer, 5 ounces of wine, or 1.5 ounces of 80-proof liquor.
"If you keep drinking alcohol, it's not going to get metabolized any faster just because you've consumed more of it," explains Pandina. "Metabolism happens at a fixed rate until all the alcohol is processed."
Pandina calculates that a woman weighing approximately 110 pounds would have to drink between 12 and 13 ounces of 80-proof liquor in an hour to reach a blood-alcohol level of 0.40.
"It's still a lot but it's far less than people may imagine," says Pandina.
A person may need medical attention with a blood-alcohol level under 0.2. Vital functions may start to shut down before someone reaches 0.25. Death is possible with a blood-alcohol level of 0.3. And that's without prior liver damage from previous alcohol or drug use. A person with a damaged liver is at higher risk for catastrophic or fatal alcohol poisoning because his or her liver cannot effectively metabolize the alcohol.
"The message is very simply when you know someone has been drinking and drinking heavily, don't wait," says Pandina. "It's quite possible to revive individuals even at very high alcohol levels and keep them from having catastrophic effects."
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About this blog
Get a behind-the-scenes look at the latest stories from CNN Chief Medical Correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, Senior Medical Correspondent Elizabeth Cohen and the CNN Medical Unit producers. They'll share news and views on health and medical trends - info that will help you take better care of yourself and the people you love.


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"Imported from Detroit"
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