The Atrium

Late Summer can be a great time to adopt a pet - if you have lots and lots of extra time and money, that is. Even a free pet is very expensive, and people who say, “What a smart dog! What a nice dog you have!” don't always suspect all the socializing and training that goes into them.

A new, almost magical, training trend is “all treat based.” Dogs trained using this method will learn almost anything very quickly, for a food treat. Humans like treats too! Would you work better if your boss gave you a paycheck or whacked you with a stick? Dogs, like people, need to keep learning all their lives. GRPL offers SO many excellent training books and videos about dogs and how to train and care for them.

An interesting trend in dog breeding is the "boutique-breed" with names like Boodles, Beagapoos, and Schnoodles. Historically, there was a name for these animals: “mutts,” which still has a pejorative connotation. But it shouldn't! Many police and service organizations pull mixed breeds from the pound to train as search or therapy animals.

Part of the fun of the mixed breed is the mystery and uniqueness of their personality. And while puppies and kitties can be delightful if you are able to be at home with them 24/7 the first few months, it's hard to beat adopting the slightly older pet. What you see is what you get in this case. Skin allergies, bad hips, temperament trouble -- health challenges can be seen right away in the non-puppy pet. For advice on what to look for in the shelter dog check out this book.

You may be wondering if an older pet bonds with its owner well? Yes! Just get a big bag of liver chunks, cut-up hot dogs, a few budget burgers -- plus walkies and obedience training. In a few weeks you'll think he was bottle raised he'll be so attached to you! I once had a dog whose affections were stolen away by my husband's decision to take the dog out for car rides to McDonald's every week, where they would each get a sausage biscuit.

And in case you're inclined to adopt a different kind of pet, GRPL offers a huge selection of pet books: horses, birds, small animals, reptiles, fish, and cats. Our dog books alone number in the hundreds. I also recommend several websites, one of the best being Petfinder, where you can see current photos of pets available for adoption at local shelters.

Posted by Lisa at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you haven't been following the local news, you might not know that the City of Grand Rapids is searching for a new police chief. Public forums have been scheduled to give citizens a chance to voice their opinion about the qualities they think are important for a city police chief, and what they think the new chief's top priorities should be.

Each of the community forums will be held from 6:30 pm to 8:00 pm on the following dates:

*An additional forum is scheduled on September 10, from 12:00 pm until 1:30 pm, at the Grand Rapids Development Center, 1120 Monroe, Room 201.

Anyone who cannot attend the meetings is welcome to complete and submit the online questionnaire here.

Spanish translators will be available at the forums.

Law enforcement is important for a safe community, so get involved in this unique opportunity.

Posted by Martin at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sunday, 18 February 2007: A Real New Orleans Evening
We're back home now, but our last few days were a bit easier and we even had time to catch some French Quarter Mardi Gras.

Thursday we started by touring our crew's two other work sites: the house-on-stilts and the kitchen of the African American Baptist church. Both are in Lacombe Bayou on the north edge of Lake Pontchartrain, east of the causeway. West of the causeway is the generally wealthy white bedroom community of Mandeville. East is Lacombe Bayou, poor and black. And the two communities never mixed . . . until Hurricane Katrina. . .

The Presbyterian church where we camped, in addition to housing up to 100 volunteers at a time, has formed a partnership with the Baptist church in Lacombe, helping people work through the FEMA forms, helping muck out houses, reconstructing the Baptist church, and now beginning to build houses for the folks living in the bayou. The house-on-stilts is for an older woman who's currently in a FEMA trailer and whose only plot of land has standing water on it all the time. The crew working on the house was able to square up the stilts, build the decking, and frame all the interior and exterior walls. They had hoped to also frame the roof and get the first layer of the roof up, but they ran out of materials several times, even after raiding all the area hardware stores.

The second group was working on the Baptist church's kitchen, a separate building from the church, putting that up on pillars, squaring it, and beginning to install a new floor. They had a pretty muddy task, but made significant progress.

After touring these two sites, our wrecking crew headed into New Orleans a different way and saw even more destruction before reaching our new work site. Imagine the biggest apartment complex you know, completely abandoned with all the windows broken out. And then another. And another. And another. And a huge shopping mall. And another complex. Perhaps two miles square, all abandoned with perhaps only the shells salvageable. And imagine what it will take to save those shells if it took nine of us three days to get one modest three bedroom house ready for reconstruction.

We reached our second work site, a Presbyterian preschool in the Lakeview area that was hit pretty hard with flooding. This had been gutted already, so we just needed to pull nails, pull out all the electrical wiring, and scrape tiles off the floors. Having learned from our first site, we set the copper wires aside so scavengers didn't have to dig through everything to find them. There's several hundred dollars worth of copper in any building . . .

We ended the day a bit early to get cleaned up for our real New Orleans evening. We shopped for pralines and had jambalaya and caught the Krewe of Babylon Mardi Gras parade and returned to Preservation Hall for even better music than we had heard the time before. We finished the night with hot chocolate and beignets at Cafe du Monde, dropping powdered sugar everywhere.

And after an uneventful drive back, we're in Grand Rapids with some scrapes and bruises and stories to tell.

Posted by Marla at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wednesday, 14 February 2007: Eating Crawfish
Yesterday was day two on our house. Having done all the easy stuff the previous day, we pulled down ceilings, took out all the hard-to-get plaster, and pulled literally thousands of nails. It was absolutely gorgeous weather, but a bit warm for the work we were doing. Flying insulation combined with heat and humidity make for a pretty sticky, itchy work day.

The owner's granddaughter happened to drive by, and she spent some time telling us her memories of the place. It's been so long since Hurricane Katrina that this family seems to have done their grieving and moved on, though it still can't be easy to see all your belongings become a pile of trash on the street . . .

After the long day yesterday, we went to a local crawfish place for some true Cajun cooking. I did indeed eat crawfish. Just one. The taste was great (quite spicy), but I'm still not fond of having to dissect my food to eat it. And the crawfish looked too insect-like for me after all the cockroaches we've been seeing . . . So instead I had an excellent gumbo with shrimp and crab.

That was yesterday. Today we finished the house. We woke up to a pretty chilly morning, but warmed up quickly by ripping up all the hardwood floors. I also took out two closet ceilings and have much greater respect for John, the man who brought down the bulk of the ceilings yesterday. John had our only serious accident so far--he was pulling down the bathroom ceiling and stepped back to avoid the falling plaster and insulation and stepped on the tile where the toilet had been. That toilet must have been leaking for years, as there were no floorboards left. John broke through the tile with one leg but managed to catch himself so he didn't fall all the way to the bottom of the crawl space. His one shin and arm are scraped and swollen, but he went on to pull down the ceilings in three more rooms.

During our lunch break today the granddaughter came back to visit, bringing us a King Cake. And then we spent the afternoon pulling squareheaded nails out of the floor. But the house is finished! And tomorrow we move on to finish gutting a preschool building.

Posted by Marla at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

With Hurricane Katrina's second anniversary in the news, images from my February 2007 relief work trip to New Orleans have again become vivid. Travel with me and my companions through the sobering horrors of Katrina's devastation and the encouraging resilience expressed through Mardi Gras.

Monday, 12 February 2007: Start cleaning your closets now!
Today we mucked out a house. The neighborhood was about 1/2 mile south of Lake Ponchartrain and a few miles east of the causeway that crosses the lake. It was probably about 1/2 mile east of some of the flood gates that failed but which have now been rebuilt with help from the Dutch government, those experts at reclaiming land from the sea.

The houses there were all built after WWII--a whole neighborhood of families who went through the war, lived in an apartment complex, then built their homes and schools and churches together in the early 1950's. The woman who owns the house where we worked is now 85. She won't be coming back. She went into the house for about two minutes a year ago and said she never wanted to see the inside of her home again. Her family at that time salvaged the china and silver.

The place was flooded to the roof and water stood there for about 30 days . . .

Nearly everything had been displaced, but then you had odd things like the card table and chairs that were perfectly positioned under the sofa. They were metal and hadn't floated, while the sofa had come down on top of them.

As we cleared the house, I spent most of my time in the bedroom that was also her sewing room. Spools of thread and patterns everywhere. Books and books in the closet, most of them old and in poor shape to begin with but now completely worthless. All the gowns and clothes she saved over the years hung with mold blossoming. A punch bowl on the floor of the closet, still filled with flood water 18 months after Katrina.

In the kitchen, unopened jars of spaghetti sauce, tins of tuna fish. All kinds of medicines and towels in the bathroom closet. Spare purses in another closet along with a box full of Easter hats. Shoes and more shoes in boxes. Bags of Mardi Gras beads in the cedar closet. Bags and bags of yarn for knitting.

It took 15 of us about two hours to clear all the belongings out of the house. Then we began to tear things out. Wood trim, baseboards and molding, paneling, plaster and more plaster, floorboards, floor tiles. You know those slots in the medicine cabinet for disposing of used razors? Hundreds of razors came cascading out when we pulled off the plaster behind the cabinet.

Tomorrow we'll finish tearing everything down to studs. We think we can leave the ceiling, except for in the kitchen. Soon the "soda washers" will come in to remove the mold and treat for pests. By doing all this we'll probably have raised the value of her home by $30,000 or so, and she'll better be able to sell. Her neighbor is living in a FEMA trailer, unable to get a permit to continue work on her house. Another neighbor a few doors up had his house featured on the national news for what he spray painted on the garage door: "We shoot looters dead." He's waiting for his "Road Home" money to come through before beginning any work on his house, and he's very angry at the government about all the delays and forms.

As we were packing up for the day, two Hondurans arrived to scavenge. They came to New Orleans after the hurricane and are working as day laborers for a drywall/tile contractor, but when they don't have work, they root through piles and look for metal and anything of value. With enough time to clean there were certainly things to salvage. Knowing what I do of life in Honduras I can just imagine how wasteful they find us all.

Anyway, we survived the cockroaches, flying plaster, and broken glass. We hope to finish up this house tomorrow. Some of us will be heading to an African American church in a poor bayou community to gut the church kitchen prior to raising it a few feet and installing a new floor. Others will be working on floor joists for the house-on-stilts we're building.

And the moral I took away with me today? Start cleaning my closets now.

Posted by Marla at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

With Hurricane Katrina's second anniversary in the news, images from my February 2007 relief work trip to New Orleans have again become vivid. Travel with me and my companions through the sobering horrors of Katrina's devastation and the encouraging resilience expressed through Mardi Gras.

Sunday, 11 February 2007: Beads, Beads, Beads
We arrived in New Orleans by 2:00 pm yesterday and spent the evening in the French Quarter. The seafood was excellent, the Jazz in Preservation Hall exquisite, and the (very tipsy) balcony bead-throwers on Bourbon St. were generous and amusing.

Today we toured the lower 9th Ward . . .

The lower 9th Ward is mostly fields now--they've removed most of the houses that were knocked off their foundations when the levee broke. Every building remaining had a large X on it; our leader explained the number on the top represented the date it was checked for survivors, the number on the right the company (police, military, etc.) that had done the checking, and the number on the bottom the number of bodies found. I'm glad to say we only saw "0" for the number of bodies. They'd also often note if a cat or dog was found. All the poles had signs posted on them for clean-up, roofing, house raising or razing services, and so on. And many "for sale by owner" signs in yards.

From the grim desolation of the 9th Ward we entered St. Bernard Parish to watch the Krewe of Nemesis Mardi Gras parade. The only restaurant open on the main drag (similar to 28th St.) was Popeye's--did you know they originated in New Orleans? None of the other chain restaurants had even cleaned up their places, much less reopened for business. And the only store that seemed to be open was Home Depot. But the people of St. Bernard Parish lined the streets, begged for beads from the floats, and had a grand old time anyway.

We're set to gut a house somewhere in New Orleans tomorrow and at some point we'll be working on building a house-on-stilts for some folks living in a trailer in the bayou.

Posted by Marla at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So today we had a completely free day in Antigua, a UNESCO world heritage site since it's a charming colonial town in Guatemala (saved from the horrors of modernity by the 1773 earthquake that devastated the city but caused the Spanish to move their capital down to a safer area).

We started with lap swimming in the hotel pool at 6:30 am (yes, my cousin is crazy!). Then a comparatively leisurely breakfast buffet including an omelette, refried beans, fried plantains, and of course fresh tropical fruits (I'm in pineapple heaven!). I have to confess I skipped the tamales, since I've never been fond of them. Then we walked to the central market, first shopping a bit for handicrafts, then entering the covered market with stall after stall of fruits, vegetables, meats, and seafood. Antigua is about 90% indigenous, so it's easy to find shoppers and shop keepers in traditional dress. Speaking of which, while touring a women's cooperative yesterday, first Twyla, then I was dressed in the full traditional dress, surprisingly comfortable despite the skirt being simply six meters of cloth with a strategically wrapped strip of fabric holding it in place.

We decided to return to the hotel to drop off our packages and grab a quick lunch just as the skies opened up and it rained. But after the rain let up a bit, we set out on a walking tour to visit the public laundry area (concrete utility sinks with a large pool from which they can draw water). Not surprisingly, no one was doing laundry on a rainy Sunday afternoon. We're hoping to make an early run there tomorrow morning to see if we can find some laundresses at work before the group heads out on the bus to a volcanic lake.

Later we walked to Las Capuchinas, the ruins of an extensive convent built around 1740 and destroyed by the 1773 earthquake. This particular ruin was interesting because of its circular set of cells, though no one is certain if they were merely for prayer and meditation, or if nuns lived in them. We then walked to La Merced, the most
elaborately decorated church facade in Antigua (yellow with white Wedgwood-like decorations). This church is still in use, though only individual worshipers were praying inside.

And now Twyla and I are in Parque Central at a busy Internet cafe, not the one we tried yesterday in the barbershop next door. It was pretty odd to walk down a long hall to a barbershop and see two barber's chairs (in use) with 10 Internet stations along the opposite wall and a long line of tourists waiting to get online.

Posted by Marla at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Summer is winding down and kids are gearing up to go back to school. Teens, however, had the chance to enjoy one last summer event at some local libraries. For those teens who completed GRPL's Summer Reading Program, they had the chance to attend a so long to summer party. They played games such as musical Catchphrase, discussed books, won free school supplies. Some party attendees got to hear the local band The Antifederalists, who were also celebrating their own farewell as they played together. Congratulations to all those who finished!

Posted by Mary at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We just got back from swimming with sharks and rays. Nurse sharks and southern stingrays to be precise. And groupers and barracudas and moray eels and chubs and parrot fish and all kinds of lovely tropical creatures. Rays feel a bit like mushrooms, sharks of course feel like sandpaper. Quite amazing!

Earlier we had gone slogging through the Peten jungle, and nowhere near Internet access, but seeing sunrise (granted, a misty, moisty sunrise) over Tikal made all such modern trappings superfluous. Tikal was definitely the highlight in terms of ruins. We left our hotel at 4 am, drove over bumpy roads, saw coati mundi and anteaters, wild turkey, and jaguar crossing signs. After a two-mile hike up hundreds of steps to Temple IV, the highest in Tikal, we sat in silence while the jungle woke up. Oropendula calls, tucans clacking their beaks, black vultures airing their wings, howler monkeys screaming, and a dense mist over it all. Finally after an hour or so, the mist cleared enough to spot the pyramid in the Lost World, then Temple III, then Temples I and II. The wind blew the mist back but the eeriness only added to the atmosphere -- amazing to think that hundreds of thousands of Mayans lived in Tikal at its height.

We spent the rest of the day exploring Tikal, climbing wherever we could get a look over the canopy, and ended the visit there with another climb of Temple IV, this time in bright daylight. We were told by the tour guide that we'd walked about eight miles that day. Standing still in the jungle, just Twyla and myself, while 30 coati mundis of all ages snuffled past looking for insects was another magical experience that day.

We visited several other ruins as well, including Caracol in Belize (which involved a military escort over the "improved" dirt road that took us 2.5 hours to transit each way). We also lived in a round hut made of palm trunks and a thatched-roof for two days (with very nice indoor plumbing!). We ended the trip relaxing on Ambergris Caye, just a half mile from Belize's barrier reef.

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Ever wonder about all those anti-bacterial products that are everywhere now? How many microbes are out there anyway? If you are a germ-phobic you might be surprised (unpleasantly!) by Dr. Gerald Callahan's book, Infection: The Uninvited Universe. I had not realized the extent to which microbes inhabit our bodies: according to the author, 90 percent of the cells in our bodies are not human cells, they are microbial! Because human cells, like those in our blood, skin, livers, and hearts are about one hundred to one thousand times larger than bacterial cells--by mass and volume-- people appear mostly human. But they aren't. Who knew!?!

If you enjoy scientific writing for the non-scientist, you may find this an pleasant read. Dr. Callahan has an appointment in both pathology and English at Colorado State University; which means he knows what he's talking about. The information is presented in an interesting way, peppered with colorful anecdotes, and many topics are covered in this slim volume.

One chapter reviews the link between schizophrenia and infection, another includes a description of the ways in which infections are linked to changes in thinking and behavior that will benefit the microbe!

Some content examples include: Toxoplasma gondii, a one-celled parasite found in several mammals, including humans. But only inside the body of domestic house cats does T. gondii complete its life cycle and create newly infectious parasites to unleash on the rest of the world. Another example is T. gondii which infects a high proportion of people with schizophrenia. The significance of its link to mental illness isn't entirely clear, but it is clear that T. gondii infections can change the way animals think, even the ways humans think.”

You'll have to read the to find out what happens to rats infected with T. gondii, and how this ties in with schizophrenia.

Dr. Callahan also has another book that received equally excellent reviews: Faith, Madness, and Spontaneous Human Combustion: What Immunology can Teach Us about Self-Perception

And for more scientific papers about some of these topics, try PubMed, one of my favorite medical information websites. If one does a search for “toxoplasma gondii and schizophrenia” 36 articles will come up.

Posted by Lisa at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Ziiiiiiiinnnnnnngggggggg!! And just what do I mean by this? It's the sound a zip line makes as you speed through a rain forest canopy. Yes, I spent an afternoon with a friend hiking up a pretty steep hill in a rain forest preserve on the shores of Lake Atitlan (Guatemala), and then zipping down cables to the bottom. Along the way I ran into several spider monkeys and a large family of coati mundis. Multiple hanging bridges led to a very tall waterfall. Had I not been covered in deet I would have been eaten alive by mosquitoes.

But what an experience! There was one really long run in particular during which I looked all around, at the waterfall, and at the volcanoes across the lake, at the forest far below. Nothing but bird calls, monkey chatter, and the singing of my trolley on the zip line to hear.

Of course, that was in complete contrast to the morning when I visited three of the small indigenous villages located on the Lake Atitlan shore. It was market day in the largest village so I spent time photographing all the, mainly purple, huipiles (blouses) the women were wearing as they shopped among all the brightly colored fruits and vegetables. The pile of seafood, bowls of sheep innards, and hanging chunks of meat that attracted flies were less appealing to see and smell.

I also stopped by the home that is currently housing Maximon, a Mayan god that has taken on the trappings of a Catholic saint, Judas Iscariot, and a variety of other figures. The local culture considers it a great honor to host Maximon in their homes, but he must be cared for. Maximon eats, drinks (mainly rum), smokes, and sleeps -- with the home owner's help. The host family receives daily visitors, sometimes tourists, but usually locals along with their shaman who will perform a ceremony. It's amazing how Guatemalans have merged their gods with Catholicism, and the church -- according to my tour guide -- doesn't mind.

The last village I visited was noted for its basketry. A local family of weavers was very interesting -- a 76-year-old man and his 74-year-old wife. He still weaves on the foot loom, in addition to weaving baskets out of lake reeds. She still weaves using the back-strap loom. Their daughter sells their woven products from their home, while their 5-yr-old granddaughter charms all.

The next morning's adventure was a stop in a cemetery -- mausoleums cheek by jowl, all brightly colored with flower-filled sconces on the front. The aisles between the mausoleums even had street addresses, and the guide
told me all about the celebrations held on the day of the dead. It was a very cheerful place, with the best view in town of Lake Atitlan.

The next stop on my journey is the lowlands, jungle, and Tikal -- here's hoping I survive the heat and humidity!

Posted by Marla at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wikis, collaborative web sites that allow collective editing, have become immensely popular. There are wikis on every possible subject you can conceive and in many languages. Of course one of the most popular wikis is Wikipedia.org, the online encyclopedia created in 2001 by Jimmy Wales as a free information and research resource.

Because Wikipedia.org uses thousands of volunteers from the around the world to research and write its content (40 million pages and counting), there have been some concerns with article reliability. A new program developed by Luca de Alfaro, associate professor at the University of California (Santa Cruz), has developed a tool to help with Wikipedia's content reliability issues. The software program analyzes each Wikipedia article and color-codes the text for accuracy based on the reliability of the writer's previous articles.

Since the color-code project has been active, more than 80 percent of the articles it has tested have rated as poor, but about 70 percent of the edits flagged have been quickly corrected by the Wikipedia community. De Alfrao's demo and details about how the program works is here.

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Wondering what your neighbors are reading? Here are the top ten titles on hold for GRPL patrons as of August 1st:

Lean Mean Thirteen by Janet Evanovich
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J. K. Rowling
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
The Quickie by James Patterson
The Sixth Target by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro
Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult
High Noon by Nora Roberts
Plum Lovin' by Janet Evanovich
Simple Genius by David Baldacci
The Sunrise by Karen Kingsbury

Posted by Angela at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)