November 10, 2003

From the Inside Out
THEY RAN THROUGH THE RAIN BELIEVING

I listen. That's where my stories come from.I speak. That's how I get to meet the most incredible people. But sometimes just listening from afar is enough to fill my heart.
I don't always need to say hello to bring a perfect stranger into my life. Conversations overheard are lessons in life sometimes even more powerful than those we are a part of. This brief encounter filled my day to capacity. If only they knew the gift they gave me.

She must have been 6 years old, this beautiful brown haired, freckled faced image of innocence. Her Mom looked like someone from the Walton's or a moment captured by Norman Rockwell. Not that she was old fashioned. Her brown hair was ear length with enough curl to appear natural. She had on a pair of tan shorts and light blue knit shirt. Her sneakers were white with a blue trim. She looked like a Mom.

It was pouring outside. The kind of rain that gushes over the tops of rain gutters, so much in a hurry to hit the Earth it has no time to flow down the spout. Drains in the nearby parking lot were filled to capacity and some were blocked so that huge puddles laked around parked cars. We all stood there under the awning and just inside the door of the Wal-Mart. We waited, some patiently, others aggravated because nature messed up their hurried day.

I am always mesmerized by rain fall. I get lost in the sound and sight of the heavens washing away the dirt and dust of the world. Memories of running, splashing so carefree as a child come pouring in as a welcome reprieve from the worries of my day.

Her voice was so sweet as it broke the hypnotic trance we were all caught in. "Mom, let's run through the rain," she said. "What?" Mom asked. "Let's run through the rain!" she repeated. "No, honey. We'll wait until it slows down a bit," Mom replied. This young child waited about another minute and repeated her statement. "Mom. Let's run through the rain."

"We'll get soaked if we do," Mom said. "No we won't, Mom. That's not what you said this morning," the young girl said as she tugged at her Mom's arm. "This morning? When did I say we could run through the rain and not get wet?"

"Don't you remember? When you were talking to Daddy about his cancer, you said, "If Faith can get us through this, we can get through anything!" The entire crowd stopped dead silent. I swear you couldn't hear anything but the rain. We all stood silently. No one came or left in the next few minutes.

Mom paused and thought for a moment about what she would say. Now some would laugh it off and scold her for being silly. Some might even ignore what was said. But this was a moment of affirmation in a young child's life. A time when innocent trust can be nurtured so that it will bloom into faith.

"Honey, you are absolutely right. Let's run through the rain. If we get wet, well maybe we just needed washing," Mom said. Then off they ran. We all stood watching, smiling and laughing as they darted past the cars and yes through the puddles. They held their shopping bags over their heads just in case. They got soaked. But they were followed by a few believers who screamed and laughed like children all the way to their cars. Perhaps inspired by their faith and trust.

I want to believe that somewhere down the road in life, Mom will find herself reflecting back on moments they spent together, captured like pictures in the scrapbook of her cherished memories. Maybe when she watches proudly as her daughter graduates. Or as her Daddy walks her down the aisle on her wedding day. She will laugh again. Her heart will beat a little faster. Her smile will tell the world they love each other. But only two people will share that precious moment when they ran through the rain believing that Faith would get them through.

Yes, I did. I ran. I got wet. I needed washing.

~ Bob Perks, Motivational Speaker and Author
www.BobPerks.com

(Contributed by Phyllis from Santa Fe, New Mexico)

Yes You Can!
BE A TRAVEL PRO

How do you blend in when you don't speak the language? How do you get around without looking like you're lost? Whether you're on the road for business or pleasure, I've found some travel tips that are very useful.

First, a definition of "tourist":They act, sometimes, as if they are out of place. Kristin Lasater, a marketing manager for a car rental company in Tulsa, Okla., shared with me a long list of what she considers the "dumb things" that amateur travelers do. These include putting too much stuff in the overhead bin and "actually talking with a seatmate on the plane." Cute, but I'm more concerned with what happens after they arrive. How about looking the wrong direction before crossing the street in Great Britain? (That's what I did once, and it almost landed me in the hospital.) Or converting all of your American cash to the currency in Jamaica? Your wallet will bulge with about 10 times the number of bills, and you'll find that many Jamaican businesses would rather take American money anyway.

OK, so we know what we don't want to do when we're on the road. So, how do you travel like a pro?

Don't bring the kitchen sink. Inexperienced travelers often believe they need to take everything on their trip: cosmetics, a week's worth of clothes, extra batteries for a laptop and so forth. But most of the civilized world now offers the convenience of shopping malls and laundry facilities. Amber Brill, a catastrophe adjuster in Jacksonville, Fla., fits everything into two bags ("one small bag for essentials, like shoes and cosmetics, and a larger bag for clothes"). Her advice: Travel light. Carrying heavy suitcases really makes you look like a tourist. Might as well paint a big target on your back while you're at it.

Lose the attitude. That's the advice of Joan Schmelzle, a retired teacher from Rockford, Ill. "I try very hard to know the customs of the place I am visiting," she says. "I try very hard to be a gracious guest and never turn into the 'Ugly American.' " She also tries to keep the wide-eyed expressions to a minimum ("Wow, skyscrapers!") and to look as if she belongs. No, it's not always easy to blend in. In Europe, people always tag me as an American because I can't give up my comfortable boat shoes. But that doesn't stop me from trying.

Know your destination. "Do as much research as you can before leaving home," advises Jean Lutz, an artist from Prescott, Ariz. "The more you know about your destination, the more comfortable you'll be." For example, find out what the weather is going to be like. (You don't want to show up in San Francisco wearing shorts, for example.) Check a guidebook to see what other people think of the place. Read the local newspaper online. You'll avoid the hotspots (the dangerous places that attract both tourists and con artists or troublemakers) and find it much easier to fit in.

Act the part. How do the pros behave? As if they know what they're doing. "I make sure I approach security gates and personnel with a friendly demeanor and firm eye contact, taking care to exhibit no aura of irritation or condescension, and greeting them in a pleasant manner," says Ed Barrett, who works for a software developer in Flanders, N.J. "I make a point of greeting and speaking to gate personnel and flight attendants." That's not just something to do on the plane; you should continue the sense of comfort with your surroundings once you land. Instead of sporting a deer-in-the-headlights look, you are polite and confident. Those are qualities that are likely to keep you safe on the road.

At the same time, be prepared for anything. Shirley Whalen, a Civil Air Patrol instructor in Blairsden, Calif., doesn't leave anything to chance when she's traveling. "I carry toilet seat covers, a couple of packages of peanut butter and cheese crackers, some tissues and a spare set of keys," she says. Why? Public toilets rarely meet the sanitary standards of the civilized world. Airlines don't always serve in-flight food — and when they do, it's not always worth eating. And accidents can happen. Tourists tend to forget that when they're on the road, they're not at home. Seems obvious, but when you consider what tourists pack — and don't pack — it really isn't so obvious.

With a little knowledge, effort and practice, it isn't hard to look like you know what you're doing. But it may make for a much more pleasant — and safer — trip.

~Christopher Elliott is the editor of Elliott's E-mail, a free weekly newsletter for travelers, and the publisher of Triprights.com, a site about travel rights.

Photo: NaturalPhotos.com

The Southern Rockhopper Penguin is noisy, quarrelsome and the smallest penguin breeding in the Falkland Islands, located 300 miles east of the South American coast. It is adept at climbing very steep rock faces in a series of bounds with both feet together. Close-packed colonies on rocky cliffs can be enormous. The Falklands, with a breeding population estimated at 300,000 pairs, is the most important site in the world. Birds return from their winter pelagic wanderings (where their distribution is unknown) in October to lay two eggs, the first being smaller than the second. Adults and young that have molted depart to sea, leaving the breeding
sites completely deserted by mid-April.

LINKS THAT SHINE

"Symptom Tracker"

SymptomTracker software is an interactive, symptom-based program that affords the user an opportunity to input symptoms anonymously, discreetly, and privately, and leads them to a possible diagnosis. The short, informative "condition synopsis" includes common diagnostic test procedures and treatments.
www.SymptomTracker.com

CLICK FOR MORE LINKS

Fascinating Facts
THE HISTORY OF ASPIRIN

Aspirin or acetylsalicylic acid, is a derivative of salicylic acid that is a mild, nonnarcotic analgesic useful in the relief of headache and muscle and joint aches. The drug works by inhibiting the production of prostaglandins, body chemicals that are necessary for blood clotting and which also sensitize nerve endings to pain. The father of modern medicine was Hippocrates, who lived sometime between 460 B.C. and 377 BC Hippocrates was left historical records of pain relief treatments, including the use of powder made from the bark and leaves of the willow tree to help heal headaches, pains and fevers.

By 1829, scientists discovered that it was the compound called salicin in willow plants which gave you the pain relief. Two Italians, Brugnatelli and Fontana, had in fact already obtained salicin in 1826, but in a highly impure form. By 1829, French chemist Henri Leroux had extracted salicin, in crystalline form for the first time. In 1838, Raffaele Piria, an Italian chemist then working at the Sorbonne in Paris, succeeded in obtaining the salicylic acid in its pure state. The problem was that salicylic acid was tough on stomachs and a means of 'buffering' the compound was searched for. The first person to do so was French chemist Charles Frederic Gerhardt. In 1853, Gerhardt neutralized salicylic acid by buffering it with sodium salicylate and acetyl chloride, creating acetylsalicylic acid. Gerhardt's product worked but he had no desire to market it and abandoned his discovery.

In 1899, a German chemist named Felix Hoffmann, who worked for a German company called Bayer, rediscovered Gerhardt's formula. Felix Hoffmann made some of the formula and gave it to his father who was suffering from the pain of arthritis. With good results, Felix Hoffmann then convinced Bayer to market the new wonder drug.

Aspirin was patented on March 6, 1889. The folks at Bayer came up with the name Aspirin, it comes from the 'A" in acetyl chloride, the "spir" in spiraea ulmaria (the plant they derived the salicylic acid from) and the 'in' was a then familiar name ending for medicines. Aspirin was first sold as a powder, in 1899 the first Aspirin bottle was sold (photo above), and in 1915, the first Aspirin tablets were made.

~Mary Bellis, About.com

 

Is rubbish really warm to the touch?

Click for Answer

Laughing It Off
MAIL "MANGLEMENT"

Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert, receives many mangled quotes that his readers have overheard and emailed to him. After staring at the list for a while he realized that if he put them together they make an excellent story:

"We were sitting on our hands, twiddling our thumbs, when suddenly the door opened. It made the hair on my back stand on end."

"He was smoking like a fish and swearing like a stuck pig. I could tell from his shifty eyes that he might try to pull the fox over my leg."

"Do you have a pen?" he asked. "I need to make a mental note."

"I didn't want him to stick my pen into his ear, but I also didn't think it would be a good idea to rattle the barrel because the monkeys might shoot the fish. So I offered my pen."

"'Do you seriously think I came up the river on a banana tree?' he growled before slapping the pen from my hand."

"I wanted to fight him, but I already had too many hands in the fire."

"Still, you have to kill the stone with the bird while you can."

"He was slow as Moses. I kicked him where the moon don't shine."

"I didn't want to beat a dead bush, so I waited for his next move."

"The ball was in his camp now."

"He didn't look like he had both oars in his basket, but maybe I was trying too hard to read between the tea leaves."

-Scott Adams, Dilbert Newsletter
~Contributed by Jane at The Cat's Meow eZine

Untangling the Web

WHAT A SITE!

Shedd Aquarium
When the curators of the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, Illinois, say they can take you on a journey through the past, they're not sea-horsing around.
www.SheddAquarium.org

COMPUTER-EASE

Re-format an all caps sentence
so it's in regular, lowercase with WordPerfect or MS Word...
1. Highlight the text to de-capitalize.
2. Click Format menu, Change Case in Word Perfect; click Edit menu, Convert Case in MS Word.
3. A little screen in Word Perfect will pop up for you to select "sentence case"; a sub-menu in MS Word will give you a "lowercase" change option.

Photo: Eric Amundson /Ketchikan Daily News

Nah-nah-nah ...
A cat sits on the Thomas Basin promenade in Ketchikan, Alaska, on a foggy morning behind a helpful sign. Thomas Street, built over the water, is one of the few wood-plank streets left in town. During the season, just upstream from the Thomas Basin boat harbor, salmon can be viewed swimming beside the boardwalk. ~MSNBC