chelle

Hey cluck I'm all for personal responsibility. Unfortunately the "rules" weren't written by you and I, and life is not that simple. Paying for good mental health treatment for someone who is seriously mentally ill is very hard to do for the average family even if there is health insurance. Many families do step up to the plate and try to get help for their loved ones, but unfortunately this is not always the case. What are families supposed to do when they can't pay the bill for the hospital or for the medication needed to keep the person grounded in reality? Mental illness is way more complex than you seem to understand. What happens when the family lives hundreds of miles away and doesn't realize that something is wrong with their loved one? Or when the mentally ill loved one drops out of their family's lives? My comment about government mental hospitals does not imply that I think that mentally ill people should be committed at the gov'ts expense. Unfortunately many mentally ill homeless people who were on the streets in the early 90s had previously been in mental hospitals in the 80s. The gov't released them without a sufficient system in place to continue to see they received treatment on an outpatient basis. This reflected their priorities to save money and was not a responsible way to treat these people. Do you think that people who can't afford health insurance should be turned away from the hospital doors as well when they have some non-mental health issue? Should access to the latest treatments and medications be reserved for those people who can afford them? You seem to have a fairly simplistic view of how this country operates (or should operate). And the whole eye for an eye thing is pretty barbaric, especially where mental illness and crime cross paths.

Not interested in working for big business Mr. Veggie. Already gave 11 years of blood sweat and tears to their causes. I'm holding out for a non-profit hospital system. Now if only our government would allocate some money to fund the special grants and loans for nursing education they promised all of us last year, I would be very appreciative.

Trask - yes there are a lot of things wrong with that act and the Patriot II act. I think when it was passed people didn't object because they were afraid and didn't think they would be hassled by their own government. From what I have read, Howard Dean seems to be the candidate who is most outspoken against the act. Have you looked at him as a possible candidate you could support? He is fiscally conservative and also pro-gun. One other scary thing that no one seems to be concerned about is the whole microchip identification tag. There are people marketing them (and people dumb enough to have them inserted) as a way for family members to claim bodies when something devastating happens and a body is hard to identify. These things were written about back in Penthouse (yes, there are some good articles in between the photos and the Forum ) back in the late 90s when the gov't started talking about inserting them in soldiers and prisioners. They were excited that the identification technology could be paired someday with GPS and they would be able to recapture escaped prisioners or find pilots who'd been shot down. I think it is a slippery slope to allow the gov't to track people via implanted GPS chips and a massive invasion of privacy. Some 11 year old kid was one of the first people to have one implanted after 9-11. And on the drug war...Do you really believe that the government is engaged in a war on drugs?

Will - everytime you post something about the south and rednecks I think of this and just crack up. Have you ever read Deliverance? I had to read it in my Romantic Lit class in college. That was one disturbing book. More so than the movie.

Agree with Erock. The snow was really good last time I was there, and it was great this time up high or off to the side of the groomed areas. It just sucked where they had groomed. Unfortunately I am not good enough at snowboarding to stray too far from the groomed blue runs. I think there is more snow at Baker than at Stevens. From what I've heard Stevens tends to consistently be more icy, but I've never been there so I don't know.

Cracked is young and hasn't really discovered how to think for himself, nor does he understand the value of an informed opinion in a discussion.

I think thumbs or wrists are the tops, then necks.

Oh, but there are fields of poppies though...

The guy could have been really high on drugs too, but if he was mentally ill they won't be able to prosecute him in the same way as if he were sane at the time of the murder. Most schizophrenics are more of a danger to themselves than to others. There are exceptions though and it is sad when someone has some form of psychotic break that results in others getting killed. Unfortunately mental health is not a priority in this country. Started back in the 80s when many state mental hospitals let nearly everyone who could marginally be classified as funtional out to save money. The general public is not educated about mental health and because they are afraid of it, have the attitude of our beloved cracked and trask. "Just kill the MFers!"

And it would have been nice if in his last pledge on the issue he had earmarked money to explore ways to affordibly produce hydrogen fuel cells that did not involve burning fossil fuels and creating more pollution than the fuel cell cars would save.

I thinnk it all fits well. Bush and his cronies are all about helping big business.

Supposedly they got 9 inches of new on Friday. I think most of it was up high or real wet down low so when the grooming machines did their thing it just froze up down low. Saturday it snowed a bit but I don't think more than a couple inches would have accumulated.

Common point to break for youth (and snowboarders). It's right where the bone is growing. Good luck with the surgeon tomorrow. Good news is that once the fracture heals it will be stronger than before. The muscles might be a little atrophied but that'll come back in time. He sounds like an active kid.

Yeah, but again it is not about comfort...it's about fasion.

Just make sure to color coordinate so you don't end up totally clashing. Fashion is what it is all about sister.

That's a cool little ritual. On New Year's Eve, I've gotten inthe habit of writing 3 things on a piece of paper and burning it. 1) one thing you are thankful came into your life in the last year 2) one thing you want to rid yourself of in the coming year 3) one thing you want to invite into your life for the coming year Another zen ritual a some friends of mine started doing a few years ago.

Yes. right back at ya smarty pants.

Lactose intollerance. Yeah no kidding. I didn't know there was a name for it. I don't think 3.5 weeks of no dairy is a long time. But whatever. I caught some kind of bug and now I can't eat dairy, whether the parasite caused it or the antibiotics did is kinda moot... No amount of bacteria flora supplements helps, I've tried them all. That stuff is like throwing good money down the toilet.

A little facetious perhaps, but sometimes it bothers me when I check to see who else is playing in this sand box at the moment and there are 4 registered users and 20 anonymous people.

That sucks that your son got hurt. How bad is the break? Where in the arm? Most breaks take about 6 weeks to heal, so he could be out there by Feb. Still a lot of the season left at that point.

All the "Anonymous" people logged into this web site. What's up with you lurkers hiding behind not only an avatar, but hiding completely from view?

That has to be the sketchiest advice I've ever heard of from one of those columns. Pray tell what conditions would this be useful in? Not that I'd try it, but it might have come in handy for climbing the first pitch of Silent Running two summers ago. It was still under snow and we wanted to leave our packs at the base. Slipping and sliding in my 5.10s sucked.

TR for Mt. Baker on Saturday: Snow was good up high on the slopes, but sucked down low. Kept catching edges and feel like I got completely worked. Couple of face plants and one tumble on the hard pack. Mild case of whiplash has me thinking about skiing again. I rarely felt this sore while snow sliding on two planks.

Not much to tell... Went trekking in Nepal, thought I was careful to treat/filter all water. Two days before I left for home, started to feel pretty bad. On the flight felt really bad. Ruined my 29th b-day. Initially I thought it was cool to cross so many time zones and have like 36 hours for my b-day, but it just ended up prolonging my agony. Symptoms pointed to giardia, but tests found nothing. Took high doses of 2 kinds of antibiotics to kill 'lil buggers. Sick off and on for 5 months. Docs did tests and even biopsied my small intestine (ouch). No diagnosis. Family friend recommended that I try giving up dairy, because someone they knew had to do that after getting home from Nepal with some intestinal hijackers. In 3 days I felt like a new person. I try pretty hard to avoid dairy these days. Makes me feel really yucky! No more Haagen Das. Now I eat Double Rainbow soy frozen deserts. Blueberry is really good.