Well, the PT folks called back, and are getting verification from insurance. Let's hope that doesn't take too long. I'm keeping my 9am deadline.
Brother apparently got hit by a car on his bike last night... got ten stitches in his chin, and went to the emergency room. He's fine now, apparently they got the license number of the white Cadillac that hit him, and ran. Fortunately, he was able to call an ambulance with his cell-phone. He's good enough to go back to work today, and no concussion. If I had a nickel for every time that kid's been to the ER, I'd have a good sock-load of nickels, usable to knock out people like a blackjack. I can count off the top of my head at least 10 times in the last 2 or 3 years. I'm very happy that he's OK, and hope that his bones stay strong and his skull un-cracked.
I still haven't seen hide nor hair of Ray online or telephone-wise since before surgery. No replies to emails, and no activity on the necromancer games website. I hope that it's something as simple as having telephone trouble.
Danny's healing up well from his illness... and has today off to play catch up, as his school reworks national holidays into 3-day weekends.
Super hot showers are still counted as a delightful blessing. In fact, I think I'll take one now.
Vampire game clue - "Pssst. Empaths Guild 1 is right next to Vauxite and 12th today. I don't know how much longer it will be there, though."
How Livejournal works diagram (via)
Well, I went to set up physical therapy, and the place across the street really only works with the doctor upstairs. Since the doc upstairs is the guy who recommended my surgeon, I went to the office and asked if they could transfer the 'scrip over from one doctor to the other, and they said it'd be no problem. I waited in the office for about 15 minutes, and the receptionist told me that the doc's too busy right now to fill it out, but that they'd take it downstairs, and PT would call me up here at home to help set up an appointment schedule. They get until tomorrow morning, 9am, before I start calling. (I know how this stuff can fall through the cracks.) During my brief visit on the second floor, *everyone* remarked on how much weight I've lost, which had a legit feel to it, and was a nice positive reinforcement.
On the return trip to my apartment, I checked the mail, and noticed that the ground in front of the mailboxes was littered with assorted junk mail fliers and opened envelopes addressed to Frankie the Mooch. I collected the trash, put it in a plastic grocery bag, and hung it on his doorknob. Hopefully that'll be signal enough for him to pick up after himself.
Sea Monkey Action Figures!
I'm considering seriously putting together a Menstrual Tracking / charting program, similar to the system I've been working with for the last few years just for the heck of it. I'm not sure what I'll do with it, whether I should try to sell it for a low price (like $5-10), make it postcard-ware (I love to get little notes in the mail), or just freeware.
Of course, my next question is what to write it in...Visual Basic or C++ would be easiest for me, but limits it to Windows. If I wrote it in Java, it could be hosted most places, and if it was assembled in SQL, it might be a nifty thing to host on a website somewhere, as well as locally. Something for me to ponder, and fiddle with. Maybe I'll ask at the what folks would want in such a program.
Other software is out there, but I haven't seen any freeware yet.
Frank Cerabino suggests avoid state meddling: Start a school. There will be start-up costs, though: You'll need a P.O. box and an account for cashing the state checks.
If you're smart, you should start figuring out a way to make a buck on education in Florida.
Now that the state pays for voucher programs that undermine that awful entitlement program known as public education, the schooling of kids is shifting to where it should be: in the hands of imaginative entrepreneurs who need little but their own wiles to succeed.
No buildings to maintain. No yellow buses to drive. No standardized testing to pass.
Virtual schools, providing virtual educations, virtually free of government meddling.
Get in while the getting is good. After all, Republicans aren't going to run the show forever.
The way you do it is simple: Call yourself a private school.
The word "school" might sound daunting, summoning notions of teaching credentials and detailed curricula. But relax. That's just for those public school saps.
You're a distance-learning virtual private school without walls. You're exempt from nearly everything, except the government check in the mail.
Which reminds me, get a post office drop box. You can run your "school" from a van down by the river or a table at the nearest Starbucks. But you'll need a drop box so the state will know where to send the checks.
Please check in every couple months
Personally, I don't have any experience running a school. So I plan to model my private school after an existing one, the Ogburn Home School Southeast Atlantic Academy.
It operates out of a post office box in Fernandina Beach. It's a very flexible program, and the $1,500-a-year tuition is subsidized for some of its students by a state voucher program.
I know if I had a chance to go through high school again, I'd like a program like Ogburn's.
"Complete your assignments at your own pace and return to us for grading," the school's Web site says. "... You may send in work at your convenience, but at least every nine weeks."
Once every nine weeks? That DOES sound convenient!
The assignments are graded, then sent back in the mail. And there are no final exams, another plus for any teenager.
"We use the portfolio method of evaluation," the school's Web site explains.
Get yer sailor suit
But the best part is that students can receive high school credit for something called "life experience."
The school cites an example of a student who is four credits short of a high school diploma but has worked for years on a boat.
"Guess what? With our program, you have earned those 4 credits!" the school's Web site says. "We have nautical course listings, and you have the life experience for us to give them to you, without actually taking the course!"
Nautical course listings? Ahoy, ye graduate matey!
Prospective students can determine what other high school credits they might have also validated by listing such things as "church activities, musical ability, and homemaking skills."
Who knows? You might already be a sophomore -- especially if your parents are of different religions, you sing in both choirs and you do ironing and vacuuming.
The important thing to remember, as you start your virtual private school, is that you are in the vanguard of this new exciting business, ready to assist Florida lawmakers who are eager to shed the burdensome yoke of public education, which is both far too costly and severely lacking in nautical course listings.
Katherine Harris is considering running for Senate? There is no way I could ever sanction voting for her, after the huge mess she was responsible for in Florida a few years back. (An entertaining summary in flash... warning, there is sound)
1. Mis-use of Taxpayer Funds
Harris visited eight countries on 10 foreign trips, staying at luxury hotels at taxpayer expense during the first 22 months in office & spent over $106,000 then went on to increase to $3.4 Million with a request from Harris for over $5 Million in 2002. The creation of the group (international relations), which was not discussed publicly, was buried on page 363 of the 420-page recent state budget. (CBS News July 1,2001)
Katherine Harris stiffed the Florida taxpayers for the cost of trips that were for her personal enjoyment and pleasure (Haircuts in Paris, etc.).
Voter Fraud
Ms. Harris blatantly used racist tactics to rescind voting rights of innocent African American & other minority voters and thereby set the stage for voter fraud that originated with a list which she accepted from Texas, illustrating the intent to aid and abet the George Bush campaign in usurping our rights to select our president.
Democrats.com has documented 14 official crimes by Katherine Harris for the Stolen Election http://democrats.com/display.cfm?id=246 They also documented other crimes including violations of state travel regulations, personal use of government resources, fraudulent record keeping, violation of Inspector General Law, & the firing of her inspector general after he refused to change a report on the department's financial operations.
Harris hid the conduct of her office during the campaign & recount allowing partisan politics to take place in her office. She covered up of her crime by placing new operating systems on computers. Broke Florida's Sunshine (public records) law by withholding documents from journalists
2. Neglect of Duties as Secretary of State
(St. Pete Times 8/4/02) Katherine Harris is the first secretary of state in Florida history who could credibly claim ignorance of the state's election laws as an excuse for fouling up her own election plans. Even when she was seeking the office four years ago, she made it obvious that she was more interested in culture and trade, tangential aspects of the job that required her to do little more than travel, smile and attend innumerable receptions.
Harris' consistent rulings on behalf of George W. Bush's campaign (election 2000) were based on factors other than her thorough analysis of Florida election law. The leadership of the free world wasn't affected by the Division of Elections' foul-up of filing fees that caused more than 100 candidates' paperwork to be declared invalid at the last minute. Harris, typically, was nowhere to be found during that most crucial week in the election process. (St. Pete Times 8/4/02)
Harris was allowed to back date her resignation so she could qualify to run for Congress... once again proving there is a whole other set of laws if you are wealthy.
(From Salon): Fast-forward two years. There's another close race in Florida. This time, younger brother Jeb is fighting to fend off a challenge from Bill McBride for the governor's race. The Nov. 5 face-off could again come down to thousands, if not hundreds, of votes.
Eventually the list will be fixed, state officials have promised, in accordance with a settlement with the NAACP in its civil rights suit against Florida following the 2000 election. But not until the beginning of next year -- and after Jeb Bush's reelection bid is long over. (Salon.com 2002)
AND the election (S-election) that would send Katherine Harris to Congress.
A signal has been sent to the nation that voter fraud in coming elections is guaranteed unless the people who have planned & carried out these frauds are stopped now. Missing voting equipment, touch screen machines with no means of vote verification & voter roll purges are just the tip of the iceberg in the massive voter fraud that is sure to continue unless we demand that our elected officials do the job they were elected to do and to rid ourselves of those known to have participated in the past frauds. We deserve honest elections.
Katherine Harris should be prosecuted, convicted & imprisoned for the above mentioned crimes. Ms. Harris's assets should be seized to reimburse the state for mis-used funds and to reimburse the citizens of Florida for the salary paid to her for a job that she not only did not fulfill, but instead slandered the good name of the State of Florida with her criminal actions.
I really don't see her making it, but it's a slap in the face that she's even running.
For good dirt on *all* of the presidential candidates, my favorite site is still the Skeleton Closet. The content is growing as we get closer to election time.
Ooh... a Wooden Keyboard. I'd seriously consider getting one.
Cult told my son he was a werewolf
A QUASI-religious cult is using the Internet to recruit teenagers who are encouraged to act as werewolves, howl at the moon and eat raw meat.
Counsellors at the Cult Information Hotline have received several complaints about the group, which has more than 50 members throughout Queensland.
Counsellors and concerned parents said complaints had been made to police and government authorities about the activities of cult members in Housing Commission properties.
A Brisbane mother told last week how her 19-year-old son became involved with the group after meeting members over the Internet.
And Queensland Health social worker David Ward confirmed that he had tried to help the teenager.
"My concern is these kids believe they can turn into werewolves and start eating raw meat, which makes them sick," Mr Ward said.
"The teenager I spoke to a couple of times, who is living with this group, is just your average adolescent.
"There's a myth that says there must be something wrong with these children or they come from a broken home.
"This boy was going through normal adolescent stuff. They go through an identity crisis, where they wonder who they are, and they're vulnerable."
The teenager's mother spoke to The Sunday Mail on the condition she not be identified because she feared her family could face threats from the cult.
"My son had been studying really hard at school, he was very quiet and I suggested he join a computer group," she said.
The woman said her son stumbled on to a group that she later discovered was involved in lycanthropy, or the practice of werewolfism.
"A young man then kept ringing us, wanting my son to come out and within three weeks he was part of the group," the mother, 50, said.
"This fellow started to stalk us at night. He'd start howling like a werewolf at midnight outside our house, which frightened the other kids.
"My son left and moved into a house with this fellow and another bloke. They would dress up in costumes like wolves and take my son on a leash to South Bank."
The mother still maintains weekly telephone contact with her son, who has joined other cult members interstate. She said she had became concerned about his health after he joined the group several months ago.
"They drink blood and eat raw meat. My son lost a lot of weight," she said.
Mr Ward said the teenager's health had deteriorated at one stage but he appeared to have recovered, although he still refused to return home.
"The police can't do anything about these groups. It's not as if they're breaking the law," he said.
"This mother will have to wait until her son comes to his senses. It could take two months, or two decades, depending on the person."
Ok, even Rotten Tomatoes gives The Matrix 3 a foul review, overall. It's currently at 35%, and generally a 60% is a sign of a decent flick. A cursory scan of the positive reviews on the page are almost apologetic, too. How could the series have fallen so far? Ah well, the first one holds its own well enough. (See: Highlander & Co. for the words worst trilogy fall from a good movie to bad)
Oh, man. Apparently This weekend was the Garlic Festival, too. *tummy rumble* I think some roasted Garlic would set me right.
Stryper was playing up the street. Hover over the name... I'm a little embarrassed that I know what the name of the band means. 80's Christian Metalheads, still on tour. Suddenly, I'm glad that I'm staying at home tonight.
Random Scotto Factoid: I am hard to impress, but easy to please.
Random Ol'-west / talking dog joke -
Pure Excitement Comics: Long lost golden age comics scanned in, and put online. Gosh, they're corny. Issue one features Yank & Doodle, Magno, and Kid Tyrant!
So bad, that I had to make this icon from issue #2. I'm not sure what I'll ever use it for, but it cracked me up too much to ignore. Oh, the times were so different back in the 40s.
In related news, Avengers / JLA... a good comic book Fan's Wallpaper. I can name a good chunk of these guys.
Flannery O'Connor wrote your book. Not much escapes
your notice.
Which Author's Fiction are You?
brought to you by Quizilla
Apparently, researchers at Rice University in Houston have invented a "gold bullet" only 100 nanometers across that targets and kills cancer cells that can't be operated on or are too small to find.
Gold "nano-bullets" could seek and destroy inoperable human cancers, suggest new studies by US scientists.
The tiny silica particles are plated with gold and heat up when near infrared light (NIR) is shone on them. This kills the cancer cells. Tests on human breast cancers, both in the test tube and in tumors in mice, were highly successful, the researchers report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"The nanoshells are designed to absorb near infrared light and convert that light to heat," explains Jennifer West, who led the study at Rice University, Houston, Texas. This is possible because the body's normal tissues are "essentially transparent" to NIR.
West says the potential benefits of the treatment should be that, unlike other cancer treatments such as surgery, it would be non-invasive. Both NIR and the nanoshells are completely harmless by themselves, she says.
"We believe that we should also be able to treat very small metastases, not detected yet," West told New Scientist. More recent, unpublished work by the group, has shown that the gold bullets can be injected into the blood stream and find their way to cancer cells in mice.
"These results are promising, particularly for tumors that cannot be treated by surgery," says Emma Knight, at Cancer Research UK. "However, the studies are at a very early stage."
On/off switch
The Rice University team created nanoparticles from a non-conducting core of silica with a diameter of 110 nanometres and a 10 nm thick metal shell. Gold was used because it is biologically inert.
When the nanoshells were added to human breast cancer cells in the test tube, and then exposed to both NIR, 100 per cent were killed, says West. "And we saw no changes in cell viability with just nanoshells or just the laser - it's a true on/off situation."
The team also injected the nanoshells directly into the tumors of living mice and applied NIR. The tumors were destroyed within days.
Warming the tumor cells to only about 55°C is enough to kill them, because it changes the permeability of the cell membrane. "Leakiness is what causes the cell to die," West explains. "Cells normally have to have a very tightly controlled barrier between the inside of the cells and the fluid surrounding them. If you disrupt that, you create huge pores which lets everything across, significantly changing the composition of the fluid inside - it ends up very toxic."
Right on target
The team has now engineered the nanoshells to specifically target tumor cells. In a recent study, submitted to Cancer Letters, they injected mice with nanoshells attached to an antibody that only binds to cancer cells. She says the tumors were "completely destroyed" and 150 days later the mice were alive and well with no tumor growth.
This unpublished study was done in collaboration with Nanospectra Biosciences in Houston, which is now in talks with the US Food and Drugs Administration about moving to human clinical trials within the next 12 to 18 months. These trials are planned in patients with a severe, highly lethal form of lung cancer called mesothilioma.
West says that in the longer term, they hope the nanoshells could even be used as a precautionary measure, killing cancers while they are too small to be detected. "For example, if you had genes predisposing you to breast cancer, you could have this done on a periodic basis," she says.
Nanoshells have not been used to treat cancer before, but the concept of targeting tumor cells and then delivering a killer blow not unique. For example, a team at Nottingham University in the UK is developing a way of delivering a "prodrug" using tumor-loving bacteria. When the drug is activated by an injected molecule, only the tumor cells are killed.
Going to sign up for outpatient physical therapy today at the place across the street, again. Scheduled for four weeks at 3x a week. I'm looking forward to the electro-stim again. Until later, dear journal.
Brother apparently got hit by a car on his bike last night... got ten stitches in his chin, and went to the emergency room. He's fine now, apparently they got the license number of the white Cadillac that hit him, and ran. Fortunately, he was able to call an ambulance with his cell-phone. He's good enough to go back to work today, and no concussion. If I had a nickel for every time that kid's been to the ER, I'd have a good sock-load of nickels, usable to knock out people like a blackjack. I can count off the top of my head at least 10 times in the last 2 or 3 years. I'm very happy that he's OK, and hope that his bones stay strong and his skull un-cracked.
I still haven't seen hide nor hair of Ray online or telephone-wise since before surgery. No replies to emails, and no activity on the necromancer games website. I hope that it's something as simple as having telephone trouble.
Danny's healing up well from his illness... and has today off to play catch up, as his school reworks national holidays into 3-day weekends.
Super hot showers are still counted as a delightful blessing. In fact, I think I'll take one now.
Vampire game clue - "Pssst. Empaths Guild 1 is right next to Vauxite and 12th today. I don't know how much longer it will be there, though."
How Livejournal works diagram (via
Well, I went to set up physical therapy, and the place across the street really only works with the doctor upstairs. Since the doc upstairs is the guy who recommended my surgeon, I went to the office and asked if they could transfer the 'scrip over from one doctor to the other, and they said it'd be no problem. I waited in the office for about 15 minutes, and the receptionist told me that the doc's too busy right now to fill it out, but that they'd take it downstairs, and PT would call me up here at home to help set up an appointment schedule. They get until tomorrow morning, 9am, before I start calling. (I know how this stuff can fall through the cracks.) During my brief visit on the second floor, *everyone* remarked on how much weight I've lost, which had a legit feel to it, and was a nice positive reinforcement.
On the return trip to my apartment, I checked the mail, and noticed that the ground in front of the mailboxes was littered with assorted junk mail fliers and opened envelopes addressed to Frankie the Mooch. I collected the trash, put it in a plastic grocery bag, and hung it on his doorknob. Hopefully that'll be signal enough for him to pick up after himself.
Sea Monkey Action Figures!
I'm considering seriously putting together a Menstrual Tracking / charting program, similar to the system I've been working with for the last few years just for the heck of it. I'm not sure what I'll do with it, whether I should try to sell it for a low price (like $5-10), make it postcard-ware (I love to get little notes in the mail), or just freeware.
Of course, my next question is what to write it in...Visual Basic or C++ would be easiest for me, but limits it to Windows. If I wrote it in Java, it could be hosted most places, and if it was assembled in SQL, it might be a nifty thing to host on a website somewhere, as well as locally. Something for me to ponder, and fiddle with. Maybe I'll ask at the
Other software is out there, but I haven't seen any freeware yet.
Frank Cerabino suggests avoid state meddling: Start a school. There will be start-up costs, though: You'll need a P.O. box and an account for cashing the state checks.
If you're smart, you should start figuring out a way to make a buck on education in Florida.
Now that the state pays for voucher programs that undermine that awful entitlement program known as public education, the schooling of kids is shifting to where it should be: in the hands of imaginative entrepreneurs who need little but their own wiles to succeed.
No buildings to maintain. No yellow buses to drive. No standardized testing to pass.
Virtual schools, providing virtual educations, virtually free of government meddling.
Get in while the getting is good. After all, Republicans aren't going to run the show forever.
The way you do it is simple: Call yourself a private school.
The word "school" might sound daunting, summoning notions of teaching credentials and detailed curricula. But relax. That's just for those public school saps.
You're a distance-learning virtual private school without walls. You're exempt from nearly everything, except the government check in the mail.
Which reminds me, get a post office drop box. You can run your "school" from a van down by the river or a table at the nearest Starbucks. But you'll need a drop box so the state will know where to send the checks.
Please check in every couple months
Personally, I don't have any experience running a school. So I plan to model my private school after an existing one, the Ogburn Home School Southeast Atlantic Academy.
It operates out of a post office box in Fernandina Beach. It's a very flexible program, and the $1,500-a-year tuition is subsidized for some of its students by a state voucher program.
I know if I had a chance to go through high school again, I'd like a program like Ogburn's.
"Complete your assignments at your own pace and return to us for grading," the school's Web site says. "... You may send in work at your convenience, but at least every nine weeks."
Once every nine weeks? That DOES sound convenient!
The assignments are graded, then sent back in the mail. And there are no final exams, another plus for any teenager.
"We use the portfolio method of evaluation," the school's Web site explains.
Get yer sailor suit
But the best part is that students can receive high school credit for something called "life experience."
The school cites an example of a student who is four credits short of a high school diploma but has worked for years on a boat.
"Guess what? With our program, you have earned those 4 credits!" the school's Web site says. "We have nautical course listings, and you have the life experience for us to give them to you, without actually taking the course!"
Nautical course listings? Ahoy, ye graduate matey!
Prospective students can determine what other high school credits they might have also validated by listing such things as "church activities, musical ability, and homemaking skills."
Who knows? You might already be a sophomore -- especially if your parents are of different religions, you sing in both choirs and you do ironing and vacuuming.
The important thing to remember, as you start your virtual private school, is that you are in the vanguard of this new exciting business, ready to assist Florida lawmakers who are eager to shed the burdensome yoke of public education, which is both far too costly and severely lacking in nautical course listings.
Katherine Harris is considering running for Senate? There is no way I could ever sanction voting for her, after the huge mess she was responsible for in Florida a few years back. (An entertaining summary in flash... warning, there is sound)
1. Mis-use of Taxpayer Funds
Harris visited eight countries on 10 foreign trips, staying at luxury hotels at taxpayer expense during the first 22 months in office & spent over $106,000 then went on to increase to $3.4 Million with a request from Harris for over $5 Million in 2002. The creation of the group (international relations), which was not discussed publicly, was buried on page 363 of the 420-page recent state budget. (CBS News July 1,2001)
Katherine Harris stiffed the Florida taxpayers for the cost of trips that were for her personal enjoyment and pleasure (Haircuts in Paris, etc.).
Voter Fraud
Ms. Harris blatantly used racist tactics to rescind voting rights of innocent African American & other minority voters and thereby set the stage for voter fraud that originated with a list which she accepted from Texas, illustrating the intent to aid and abet the George Bush campaign in usurping our rights to select our president.
Democrats.com has documented 14 official crimes by Katherine Harris for the Stolen Election http://democrats.com/display.cfm?id=246 They also documented other crimes including violations of state travel regulations, personal use of government resources, fraudulent record keeping, violation of Inspector General Law, & the firing of her inspector general after he refused to change a report on the department's financial operations.
Harris hid the conduct of her office during the campaign & recount allowing partisan politics to take place in her office. She covered up of her crime by placing new operating systems on computers. Broke Florida's Sunshine (public records) law by withholding documents from journalists
2. Neglect of Duties as Secretary of State
(St. Pete Times 8/4/02) Katherine Harris is the first secretary of state in Florida history who could credibly claim ignorance of the state's election laws as an excuse for fouling up her own election plans. Even when she was seeking the office four years ago, she made it obvious that she was more interested in culture and trade, tangential aspects of the job that required her to do little more than travel, smile and attend innumerable receptions.
Harris' consistent rulings on behalf of George W. Bush's campaign (election 2000) were based on factors other than her thorough analysis of Florida election law. The leadership of the free world wasn't affected by the Division of Elections' foul-up of filing fees that caused more than 100 candidates' paperwork to be declared invalid at the last minute. Harris, typically, was nowhere to be found during that most crucial week in the election process. (St. Pete Times 8/4/02)
Harris was allowed to back date her resignation so she could qualify to run for Congress... once again proving there is a whole other set of laws if you are wealthy.
(From Salon): Fast-forward two years. There's another close race in Florida. This time, younger brother Jeb is fighting to fend off a challenge from Bill McBride for the governor's race. The Nov. 5 face-off could again come down to thousands, if not hundreds, of votes.
Eventually the list will be fixed, state officials have promised, in accordance with a settlement with the NAACP in its civil rights suit against Florida following the 2000 election. But not until the beginning of next year -- and after Jeb Bush's reelection bid is long over. (Salon.com 2002)
AND the election (S-election) that would send Katherine Harris to Congress.
A signal has been sent to the nation that voter fraud in coming elections is guaranteed unless the people who have planned & carried out these frauds are stopped now. Missing voting equipment, touch screen machines with no means of vote verification & voter roll purges are just the tip of the iceberg in the massive voter fraud that is sure to continue unless we demand that our elected officials do the job they were elected to do and to rid ourselves of those known to have participated in the past frauds. We deserve honest elections.
Katherine Harris should be prosecuted, convicted & imprisoned for the above mentioned crimes. Ms. Harris's assets should be seized to reimburse the state for mis-used funds and to reimburse the citizens of Florida for the salary paid to her for a job that she not only did not fulfill, but instead slandered the good name of the State of Florida with her criminal actions.
I really don't see her making it, but it's a slap in the face that she's even running.
For good dirt on *all* of the presidential candidates, my favorite site is still the Skeleton Closet. The content is growing as we get closer to election time.
Ooh... a Wooden Keyboard. I'd seriously consider getting one.
Cult told my son he was a werewolf
A QUASI-religious cult is using the Internet to recruit teenagers who are encouraged to act as werewolves, howl at the moon and eat raw meat.
Counsellors at the Cult Information Hotline have received several complaints about the group, which has more than 50 members throughout Queensland.
Counsellors and concerned parents said complaints had been made to police and government authorities about the activities of cult members in Housing Commission properties.
A Brisbane mother told last week how her 19-year-old son became involved with the group after meeting members over the Internet.
And Queensland Health social worker David Ward confirmed that he had tried to help the teenager.
"My concern is these kids believe they can turn into werewolves and start eating raw meat, which makes them sick," Mr Ward said.
"The teenager I spoke to a couple of times, who is living with this group, is just your average adolescent.
"There's a myth that says there must be something wrong with these children or they come from a broken home.
"This boy was going through normal adolescent stuff. They go through an identity crisis, where they wonder who they are, and they're vulnerable."
The teenager's mother spoke to The Sunday Mail on the condition she not be identified because she feared her family could face threats from the cult.
"My son had been studying really hard at school, he was very quiet and I suggested he join a computer group," she said.
The woman said her son stumbled on to a group that she later discovered was involved in lycanthropy, or the practice of werewolfism.
"A young man then kept ringing us, wanting my son to come out and within three weeks he was part of the group," the mother, 50, said.
"This fellow started to stalk us at night. He'd start howling like a werewolf at midnight outside our house, which frightened the other kids.
"My son left and moved into a house with this fellow and another bloke. They would dress up in costumes like wolves and take my son on a leash to South Bank."
The mother still maintains weekly telephone contact with her son, who has joined other cult members interstate. She said she had became concerned about his health after he joined the group several months ago.
"They drink blood and eat raw meat. My son lost a lot of weight," she said.
Mr Ward said the teenager's health had deteriorated at one stage but he appeared to have recovered, although he still refused to return home.
"The police can't do anything about these groups. It's not as if they're breaking the law," he said.
"This mother will have to wait until her son comes to his senses. It could take two months, or two decades, depending on the person."
Ok, even Rotten Tomatoes gives The Matrix 3 a foul review, overall. It's currently at 35%, and generally a 60% is a sign of a decent flick. A cursory scan of the positive reviews on the page are almost apologetic, too. How could the series have fallen so far? Ah well, the first one holds its own well enough. (See: Highlander & Co. for the words worst trilogy fall from a good movie to bad)
Oh, man. Apparently This weekend was the Garlic Festival, too. *tummy rumble* I think some roasted Garlic would set me right.
Stryper was playing up the street. Hover over the name... I'm a little embarrassed that I know what the name of the band means. 80's Christian Metalheads, still on tour. Suddenly, I'm glad that I'm staying at home tonight.
Random Scotto Factoid: I am hard to impress, but easy to please.
Random Ol'-west / talking dog joke -
A Three-legged dog walks into a saloon and says "I'm looking for the man that shot my paw."Nyuk nyuk.
So bad, that I had to make this icon from issue #2. I'm not sure what I'll ever use it for, but it cracked me up too much to ignore. Oh, the times were so different back in the 40s.
In related news, Avengers / JLA... a good comic book Fan's Wallpaper. I can name a good chunk of these guys.
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Apparently, researchers at Rice University in Houston have invented a "gold bullet" only 100 nanometers across that targets and kills cancer cells that can't be operated on or are too small to find.
Gold "nano-bullets" could seek and destroy inoperable human cancers, suggest new studies by US scientists.
The tiny silica particles are plated with gold and heat up when near infrared light (NIR) is shone on them. This kills the cancer cells. Tests on human breast cancers, both in the test tube and in tumors in mice, were highly successful, the researchers report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"The nanoshells are designed to absorb near infrared light and convert that light to heat," explains Jennifer West, who led the study at Rice University, Houston, Texas. This is possible because the body's normal tissues are "essentially transparent" to NIR.
West says the potential benefits of the treatment should be that, unlike other cancer treatments such as surgery, it would be non-invasive. Both NIR and the nanoshells are completely harmless by themselves, she says.
"We believe that we should also be able to treat very small metastases, not detected yet," West told New Scientist. More recent, unpublished work by the group, has shown that the gold bullets can be injected into the blood stream and find their way to cancer cells in mice.
"These results are promising, particularly for tumors that cannot be treated by surgery," says Emma Knight, at Cancer Research UK. "However, the studies are at a very early stage."
On/off switch
The Rice University team created nanoparticles from a non-conducting core of silica with a diameter of 110 nanometres and a 10 nm thick metal shell. Gold was used because it is biologically inert.
When the nanoshells were added to human breast cancer cells in the test tube, and then exposed to both NIR, 100 per cent were killed, says West. "And we saw no changes in cell viability with just nanoshells or just the laser - it's a true on/off situation."
The team also injected the nanoshells directly into the tumors of living mice and applied NIR. The tumors were destroyed within days.
Warming the tumor cells to only about 55°C is enough to kill them, because it changes the permeability of the cell membrane. "Leakiness is what causes the cell to die," West explains. "Cells normally have to have a very tightly controlled barrier between the inside of the cells and the fluid surrounding them. If you disrupt that, you create huge pores which lets everything across, significantly changing the composition of the fluid inside - it ends up very toxic."
Right on target
The team has now engineered the nanoshells to specifically target tumor cells. In a recent study, submitted to Cancer Letters, they injected mice with nanoshells attached to an antibody that only binds to cancer cells. She says the tumors were "completely destroyed" and 150 days later the mice were alive and well with no tumor growth.
This unpublished study was done in collaboration with Nanospectra Biosciences in Houston, which is now in talks with the US Food and Drugs Administration about moving to human clinical trials within the next 12 to 18 months. These trials are planned in patients with a severe, highly lethal form of lung cancer called mesothilioma.
West says that in the longer term, they hope the nanoshells could even be used as a precautionary measure, killing cancers while they are too small to be detected. "For example, if you had genes predisposing you to breast cancer, you could have this done on a periodic basis," she says.
Nanoshells have not been used to treat cancer before, but the concept of targeting tumor cells and then delivering a killer blow not unique. For example, a team at Nottingham University in the UK is developing a way of delivering a "prodrug" using tumor-loving bacteria. When the drug is activated by an injected molecule, only the tumor cells are killed.
Going to sign up for outpatient physical therapy today at the place across the street, again. Scheduled for four weeks at 3x a week. I'm looking forward to the electro-stim again. Until later, dear journal.
posted by Scottobear at
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