Bunny in your case the profession would be gigolo! Nice work if you can get it. I was never pretty enough and my gag reflex is too strong. Math has haunted me all my life, unfortunately I can't stay away from it as I am in the science field. I can barely keep my two phone numbers straight in my head. Last summer I suffered through college algebra (again) in a vain attempt to raise my GRE anayltical score. Plus studied all the tutorials for the math part in my spare time. I would hate to imagine what kind of score I would have gotten had I not done all of that! Still it wasn't good enough to get into a doctoral program. So if I ever have any spare time again, I will be back at the math tutorials. I just don't have the knack, it's a real struggle. The job I want is to write trite, innacurate platitudes and make a bundle selling books to miserable bourgeoise who dream of being a forest ranger! People say I'm a good writer. Another gig I fantasize about is travel WRITER. You know, go on fantastic trips, and then write about it for the poor slobs stuck in the office! Having had jobs that a lot of people fantasize about being easy and stress free, it is one of my pet peeves. Like the idea that teaching science to kindergarteners is "easy" because it is at a basic level. Yes of course it's easy for a college educated person to understand the science part, but the difficult part in managing the kids with their different perceptions, experience, maturity level, and 15 minute attention spans, etc. It's not just a matter of speaking slower and louder! And to work as a tour guide at a national park you have to put up with years and years of grunt work and moving from park to park. One of my former students works for the National Park Service. Sure he has had some great jobs--he once lived in a lighthouse on an island off the coast of WI on Lake Superior. But i saw him last summer and he says he longs to settle down. He said he wants to finally know where the hardware store is and what box he left that book in. He's lived in five places throughout the country in eight years--FLA, WI, CA, WA, and now ND. Yes, he's finally gotten a job where he can settle down a bit--in the Badlands! Going on a nature hike in a park is fun and relaxing, but it isn't necessarily fun and relaxing for the person who's job it is to lead it. They work hard to make it look easy. Not that I haven't loved my career, but non-competitive and stress free it aint. The visitors feel non-competitive and stress free--but they are on vacation. The employees are not, and all the things that they deal with and take care of are the stresses the visitors are there to avoid. That's what they get paid for, to deal with them so the visitors don't have to. If you live in a tony vacation spot it is even worse. On your way running errands or to the grocery or laundromat you have to pass by folks lounging around on the beach, something you would LOVE to do, if only you had the time! But you're NOT on vacation. It's like torture, lol! I much prefer grungy Allentown where the housing is affordable and the parking is ample and folks are as stuck here as you so might as well smile and make the best of it! But having worked outside most of my life I am unfortunately spoiled for a desk job. It also doesn't suit my personality--I need to be up and doing.

Thank you, Dr. Henry, for that paper on toxic GM-effects on goats. Corn & soybean & canola & cottonseed are genetically modified, the Republic Magazine stated that other grains are safe: "Other than corn, no GM grains are sold on the market. Look for 100-percent wheat pasta, couscous, rice, quinoa, oats, barley, sorghum, and dried beans (except soybeans). Most GM ingredients are products made from the “Big Four:” corn, soybeans, canola, and cottonseed. Sugar beets and 50% of Hawaii papaya are genetically modified." **** from Straw: That's why I buy sugar-cane products, rather than sugar made from beets. I fed my kid those Pepperidge Farm cookies (made from cottonseed oil) and she broke out in rashes and scratched herself bloody. I ate those cookies and had the worst hayfever: runny nose & sneezing. Went shopping yesterday: They had strawberries for $2.50 versus organic strawberries for $3.45. I sniffed both: the organic strawberries was more fragrant, versus the regular with a slight chemical scent. After sniffing both for several times, my nose was in pain (I stuck my nose too close). I realized that it's the pesticides sprayed on that inflamed my nose. My nose burned for hours afterwards Two years ago I tasted grape at the store, and had a tummy ache. Strawberries is known for the most pesticides I'm very sadden by UK’s Daily Mail report that an estimated 125,000 farmers in India have committed suicide because of crop failure and massive debt since planting GM seeds. Recent Center for Human Rights and Global Justice report: "Indian farmers bought genetically modified Bollgard Bt cotton seeds from the Gates Foundation-backed Monsanto corporation ... 85 percent of cotton grown in India being Monsanto-controlled Bt cotton by 2009. However, the seeds were expensive, and spiralling prices (coupled with planting restrictions from the multinationals selling the seeds) led farmers to hefty loans. Almost 300,000 cotton workers have committed suicide to date, some of them by drinking the same insecticides they were sold by multinationals." From Straw: Years ago I watched a documentary film "Seeds of deception" where Mexican agriculture scientists voiced concern with GM seeds corrupting the bio-diversity of local seeds, which are well-adapted to drought and adverse local conditions. Dr. Frank Lipman, from http://www.drfranklipman.com/basic-questions-on-gmos/ stated, "The major benefit of all commercial GMO’s is that they are bred to either tolerate direct application of herbicides and/or have the ability to produce their own pesticides. They have not been bred to increase yield, become drought tolerant, improve nutrition or to have any other benefit to the consumer. So at present they have no health benefit, their benefits are purely economic." *** From Straw: It's about power, money, and control. Politics and economic factors are factors, besides ill health. The vindictive dirt-throwing, defamation attacks against international scientists, and bullying tactics of big corporations made me more sick than the ill-effects of GM-foods. We are saved from our wheat being genetically-modified, thanks to the farmers voicing concerns that our wheat can't be exported, if genetically modified. More from Dr. Lipman: "In Europe, over 175 regions and over 4500 municipalities have declared themselves GM-free zones. And in 2009, Germany along with France, Hungary, Italy, Greece, Austria, Poland and Romania banned Monsanto’s MON 810 GM corn because of its documented dangers to biodiversity and human health. Additionally, states in Australia, regions in New Zealand and Brazil and the countries like Venezuela, Zambia, Sudan, Angola and others, all want to be GM-free.The balanced reporting of the press in Europe of the dangers of GMO’s made a significant contribution to the decision to reject GMO’s. Below link is a detailed list from Republic Magazine on which foods are GM-tainted: Here is a link that might be useful: List of GM foods vs. non-GM This post was edited by Strawberryhill on Sat, Mar 1, 14 at 15:06

Back in the 1990s, Mobile had a recycling project that was wonderful. Actually, it was a waste materials sorting and reclaiming facility, where stuff was gradually or methodically separated and it was paying for itself. However, it was a demonstration kind of project, and it had to be approved by the city council, and eventually it was cancelled. With as much money as can be made from reclaiming metal, glass, paperboard, it would have been a great municipal plus....a department that was paying for itself. I'm not actually doing everything that I can to recycle, because it is so (a) inconvenient, (b) space consuming, (c)time consuming. B and C are part of A. Where do you keep the piles of stuff without attracting CRITTERS? Down here, it rains so much, plants grow so quickly, that a clean collection soon becomes awash in water or leaves. Then you have to take the collected items somewhere, and that means only one place in town....except there is a private facility that will buy your aluminum drink cans so you can take them there. But sorted and washed glass, clean paperboard/boxes, styrofoam/plastics can go to the Keep Mobile Beautiful collection facility sort of downtown. So I mostly give the cans to the friend who does our yard work, and he sells them. My blue wine bottles go to another friend who is edging her flower beds with them (tops buried in the ground. I now make it a point to buy the Schmittsonne Riesling because it tastes best AND comes in blue glass bottles. There is a service which mostly serves the upscale side of town, and you pay them to come get your recycled goods. It is not a municipal service, like garbage collection and trash collection. But of course, we can put most anything in the trash (9 cubic yards every two weeks) EXCEPT for hazardous waste. Hazardous waste includes things like paint cans with some paint still in them, TV sets, batteries, cell phones. Don't know about florescent light bulbs, but they contain mercury. While they save power for you, they also pollute with mercury. It is not always simple to be a friend of the Earth. With our discussions on this forum, I am becoming more aware of recycling as a need, and sensitized to ways I can do better. Keeping clutter at a minimum means I MUST pay closer attention to what happens to my discards.

In the past, I was a real magazine junkie. But over the past few years, I have really cut back. My daughter enjoys National Geographic so we still get that one and my son asked for Nat Geo Kids so we will subscribe to that one as well. I just got a really smashing great offer for Smithsonian and so will probably subscribe to it as well. Used to subscribe to Cottage Living but stopped when I realized that every "cottage" re-do was done by an architect and his artist wife, a lawyer and his antiques dealer wife, a doctor and his interior decorator wife and that the "cottages" were usually about 3000 to 5000 square feet in size. Not my idea of a "cottage". The magazine went under. I was not surprised. Although I will say that my most favorite part of that magazine was the back page where a reader sent in a photo of his or her home and an architect/designer did a lovely sketch of the home "cottage-d up". Wish I could get his name and send him a picture of my house. I love Bookmarks and must resubscribe but then I stop and look at the lists of titles I have written down from each issue of Bookmarks. I will never get through all of my TBR lists... let alone read magazines as well! How do you all find the time?! A note on the fundraising sales. My sister bought a mag from my daughter during a fundraising drive. The magazine title was switched on her from a travel magazine to a fishing magazine with no prior warning. And because she bought it through a clearing house, she had no recourse. The travel mag went under and the clearing house substituted something of similar value without consulting her. PAM