Column
E-I-E-I-O
Feb 14th
My recent mortgage column generated a lot of interest (heh, heh). Thanks to everyone who sympathized and gave advice. I am pleased to report LoanCare was very gracious and professional in accepting one final check from me. If I was math-clever I would figure how much interest I saved by paying off the loan in half the allotted time.
Now, gentle readers, my budget is a bit more open. It is time for me to enter the 21st Century and I call for your input: I want to learn what device or service will connect me to the outside world; specifically the Internet.
I do not want the newfangled version of the Walkman because I need to hear my environment. I cannot tell you how many times I reached for a hose only to have it hiss at me and slither away. Yikes!
Last time I looked at television was ten years ago. After hearing you all talk about what’s on TV, I’m pretty sure I don’t want anything to do with that, either.
Readers, what do you recommend I buy or subscribe to for Internet access? An e-thing or an i-thing? Most important: Will it work in Bouse? This is a goofy area, radio-wise – I’m more likely to pick up Kansas City than Lake Havasu City depending on the weather.
If I want to access facebook, does that “eat bandwidth”? What about U-Tube videos? I hear about Internet providers who ban downloads or charge extra. Perhaps I should buy a raffle ticket from PAACE and try to win one of everything!
One thing my readers have in abundance are opinions. I look forward to reading yours.
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Cate Mueller is a web designer, editor, reporter and photographer in Bouse, Arizona. To visit her website, click here.
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Editor’s note 2/15: There’s less than a day now to get your iRaffle tickets! Purchase them online HERE.
Three completely unnecessary U.S. road rules
Feb 13th
Now, before my cheeky headline attracts too much trouble, let me preface by saying that I love America. I’m not one of these latter-day immigrants who move to the United States and complain about it all the time (any more than I would complain about anything else in life). I chose to move here from the United Kingdom, and I’m very happy with my choice.
You guys have great food, an upbeat attitude, an entrepreneurial spirit and – when you’re at your best – a ‘live and let live’ attitude that would make the founders of this nation very happy. Some of your motoring customs are greatly preferable to ones in my homeland. Gas pumps that continue to fill when you let go of the handle. Turning lanes. ‘Right on red.’ Drive-through ATMs. These are things I tell my UK friends it’s time they adopted over there.
But there are a few little pesky rules of the American road that simply don’t make any sense in the slightest. They’re crazy. Nuts. And it’s incumbent upon me, a dude who grew up somewhere else, to tell you when I notice these things. (Just my way of helping.) Here they are:
(1) The All-Way Stop
All-way stops are evil. Not only are they extremely inefficient, their effectiveness begins to fail with higher traffic. The daily farce of trying to figure out which vehicle stopped first, then next, then next, and when your own turn to pass through the clumsy intersection might come, followed by the inevitable moment when the entire awful thing breaks down and people resort to frustrated hand signals in an attempt to do the traffic control manually… the system indicts itself.
All-way stops will one day be studied as early traffic control systems like we study Neanderthal tools: a valiant first attempt. But this is 2012, for the love of God. Let’s be honest: it isn’t very sophisticated, is it? I can just imagine the uninspiring meeting where this was first proposed as a solution: ‘Gentlemen, we need a solution. Traffic will be getting heavier in the coming years, and we need a way to let carriages from four different directions pass through. Yes, Jenkins? What’s that? Just have them all… stop? Well, how will that help? Well, I suppose there are always hand signals.’
In fact, it’s so unsophisticated a traffic control measure that it is the default behavior when all other forms of traffic control (such as lights) have failed.
And then there’s the custom of turning many very safe drivers into lawbreakers for failing to give that final tap of the brake pedal that renders their vehicle motionless for at least a nanosecond, even if nobody else is anywhere remotely close to the intersection to make their stopping even necessary.
Every all-way stop sign should be exchanged for a variety of 2-way stops, yields and roundabouts. In Europe, they’ve moved from the crude hammer of traffic control to the pneumatic drill: roundabouts, which are are used even in small intersections because they’re vastly superior. They are superior for the following reasons: stopping only happens when it’s necessary, traffic flow is improved a thousand percent, accidents are fewer, no hand signals are required and the possibility of being ticketed for something which harms no-one is eradicated. (That’s right: roundabouts are used because they’re statistically safer than any other form of intersection.)
(2) Jaywalking laws
Why did the chicken not cross the road? Because it would be a fowl proceeding.
In fact, in the land of the free, it is illegal for even a human being to cross the road (that is, unless one is crossing at a designated crosswalk). Now, I know what you’re thinking: the road is for cars, not pedestrians. This is true. But in the United Kingdom, it’s regarded as an individual personal responsibility to cross the road safely as a pedestrian, and there is no such crime as jaywalking. This difference between our cultures’ customs was discovered by a peaceful British conference delegate visiting Atlanta a few years ago, who made the mistake of crossing the road to get to his next seminar and found himself face down on the asphalt followed by 8 hours in jail. ‘Welcome to America!’
Nobody does individual responsibility better than the United States. If you don’t wear a helmet, it’s okay; it’s your personal responsibility. If you want to drive an old car, manufactured when the only safety feature was a large grill; it’s your own responsibility. So it seems odd that the responsibility to cross the road safely is not upon the pedestrian.
Perhaps you think that repealing laws against jaywalking will just lead to more pedestrian deaths? Not according to statistics, which say that in America, pedestrian deaths are higher than in Europe.
(For extra points: do you know whose right-of-way it is when a pedestrian jaywalks? That’s right; the pedestrian.)
(3) Pulling over for emergency vehicles coming from the opposite direction
In most states including Arizona, the law requires motorists to pull over and stop, regardless of the direction or lane used by the emergency vehicle. Arizona Revised Statutes says that, when an emergency vehicle approaches, you must:
“Immediately drive to a position parallel to and as close as possible to the right-hand edge or curb of the roadway clear of any intersection. Stop and remain in the position [...] until the authorized emergency vehicle has passed.
This is unnecessary and dangerous, particularly when emergency vehicles are coming from the opposite direction. Often, drivers react to these oncoming sirens and lights in a way that, at any other time, would be regarded as erratic and foolish. In their haste to satisfy the code, they brake suddenly and dive over to the right-hand side, making drivers who haven’t yet seen the emergency vehicle coming wonder what the hell is going on.
This leads to accidents. Every year in the U.S., there are almost 16,000 collisions involving fire trucks alone (let alone police and ambulance). These accidents result in many injuries, which may be the absolute height of irony, considering that injuries are the very thing emergency vehicles and the laws surrounding them exist to reduce! We have a word to describe that: ‘counterproductive’.
How can we improve on this, reduce accidents and eliminate unnecessary stopping?
The UK Highway Code puts it this way:
“If necessary, pull to the side of the road and stop, but do not endanger other road users.”
Wow. How reasonable! How simple! It is patently not necessary for the driver of a vehicle coming southbound on Highway 95 to suddenly pull over to the side of the road when an emergency vehicle is coming northbound, a full four lanes across the roadway! This simple and effective change to the law would save lives and get rid of any unnecessary interruption to the flow of traffic.
So, there we have it, America: just three small changes that could make our lives on the roads better and safer, and could eradicate the need for frustrated hand (or even finger) signals.
Anything I can do to help.
The Starbucks Effect
Feb 10th
Earlier this morning I went to Safeway here in Parker. Starbucks is located right as you walk through those magical Star Trek-like doors that automatically open. It was an in-and-out trip so I was a bit in a hurry. As I had feared I came upon an aging line of winter visitors blocking my path to the deli so I had to change course and go by the Starbucks counter. It was here my experience began. I navigated my way past the humongous citrus display and the coffee seeking patrons in front of their frothy, caramel flavored, caffeine-delivering mothership. While zig-zagging through the crowd I accidently bumped into a woman.
I promptly said, “I’m sorry…excuse me.”, to which she replied, “Ughh…Mmnguganana uhh-uhh.” Now I’m going to be honest, I have no idea how to actually spell her reply. It was one filled with exhaustion, impatience, and disgust. Perhaps not just towards me, but towards life in general. I continued towards the deli feeling both relieved to be on my way and confused at her zombie-like response.
Average line at Starbucks
Upon leaving the deli, still in a hurry, I headed for the Checkout line. The Checkout lines are located behind the Starbucks kiosk so avoidance was futile. As I was briskly walking towards the Checkout line someone leaving the Starbucks counter stepped out in front of me. Now my brakes don’t work as well as they did ten years ago, (due mostly in part to me now having greater inertia), so there’s no surprise that I bumped into this person. I quickly apologized as they turned around…it was the same woman I bumped into when I first came in! I thought for sure I was in store for a huge dose of Chew-Out OTC, (ask your doctor or pharmacist), but what happened next is definitely worthy of my relating to you. She giggled and said playfully, “Oh I’m sorry…It sure is crowded huh?”
Before Coffee
After Coffee
There was something different about her. She was happy and filled with life. No longer a mumbling, mush-mouthed zombie.
What on Earth had changed?! The answer was clutched tightly in her hands: COFFEE. She was now a new woman, no longer troubled by crowds and tedious lines. She had been awoken and given a new lease on her day. This woman was Human once again.
So remember my friends, when you encounter a fellow human being and the experience is somewhat distasteful, it may just be that they haven’t had their cup of “Go-Juice” yet.
Coffee- Morning tested. Zombie Apocalypse approved.
900 Trillion Dollars
Feb 8th
Off The Wall #11
I read a bit on the web today about a lady in Staten Island who is suing New York City for—get this–$900 trillion dollars. You can’t even say nine hundred trillion dollars without placing your pinky finger in the corner of your mouth like Doctor Evil. Even Doctor Evil in all his evilness only asked for “one billion dollars” in exchange for not blowing up the Earth with a moon-based laser.
The lady who filed the lawsuit claims the city placed her children in foster care because she was an unfit mother who often left them alone. Oh, and she allegedly suffered from a mental illness that included “hallucinations and delusions.”
Okay, case closed. Plaintiff is clearly delusional if she thinks filing a $900 trillion lawsuit is not the act of a mentally ill person and she’s clearly hallucinating if she thinks she’s getting $900 trillion from New York City, whose entire budget for 2012 is $69 billion.
I tried Googling “Net worth of New York City” but all I got were links concerning The Real Housewives of New York City, so apparently its housewives who control most of the money there. Pretty much the same as my house, basically, but on a much smaller scale. No trillions, billions or even millions in my budget.
Nine hundred trillion is such a huge number that it would look like this if you wrote it out: 900,000,000,000,000. I’m guessing she only stopped at $900 trillion because she and her lawyer had no idea what came after a trillion. It’s actually a quadrillion, although it could just as easily be a bazillion, a gorillion, a donkeykongillion or a shakazuluillion, because the number is so large that we really don’t even use it, especially when we’re talking about money.
Even astronomers, who deal with vast distances, don’t use trillions. They jump right to AUs (Astronomical Units, or the distance to the Sun from the Earth) and light years, the distance that light travels in one year.
In fact, there is not $900 trillion in the entire economies of every country on Earth. The United States’ annual Gross Domestic Product is around $14 trillion, which is a paltry sum when compared to this lawsuit.
The richest guy on the entire planet is a Mexican billionaire named Carlos Helu, and his net worth is estimated at $74 billion, which wouldn’t pay even one percent of this lawsuit.
Estimates vary, but all the money in the world would equal about $45 trillion dollars, which would only pay about 5 percent of the crazy lady lawsuit, assuming she won her case and the jury awarded her the full $900 trillion. Maybe she’ll settle for $45 trillion and we can at least pay her upfront.
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Randy Hartless is Executive Director of the Parker Area Chamber of Commerce, columnist and regular contributor on KLPZ 1380am.
How to cure the common cold
Feb 6th
Last week, I wrote that off-road fever was about to grip the Parker area. And grip it did. 240 screaming vehicles flew 425 miles across the desert floor, kicking dust into the atmosphere and giving us the excitement (and a great sunset!) to go with it. I covered the race from KLPZ’s Parker studio, helping the rest of the KLPZ team compile several different sources of race info into one live broadcast. By the end, I was exhausted, and I thought it was this fatigue that explained my sore throat by the evening’s end.
But then my wife Melissa arrived home, telling me that she’d come down with a head cold. This made it extremely likely that I was coming down with it too. Agh. Good thing I’d already found the cure for the common cold.
That’s right: several years ago I came upon the cure for the cold, and here’s a hint: it’s not Airborne.
Airborne is the big-selling common cold remedy, despite the fact that no clinical trial has ever proven it to work. What is it, exactly? Well it’s just a collection of vitamins, herbs and minerals, packaged and marketed cleverly enough to convince people that it works (it’s formulated by a former teacher, for the love of God, the logic of which evidently appeals to the masses). I’ve lost count of the number of people who swear that it worked for them.
What’s actually happening is that they are simply speculating that their colds would have been longer without Airborne. Colds are self-limiting and last only a finite period of time, so one may feel that the product they are using when it goes away deserves the credit for ending it. That would be an error in thinking. Most people are just so happy to be better that they don’t care anymore, until the next time someone gets a cold and they tell them to load up on Airborne. Anyway, a special magical formula Airborne is not, and I wanted something that’s actually been documented to work in clinical trials.
Does such a thing exist?
Well, it turns out that it does. George Eby is the world’s leading expert on the use of zinc (hold on, not just any zinc) to reduce the severity and strength of the common cold. Zinc helps to sustain all life on earth. It’s a metal, and a food additive. You may be aware of using zinc to treat the common cold; there are several such products available at the drug store and – because everyone gets colds and everyone hates them – they sell. But they don’t sell primarily because they work; they sell merely because people think they may work, and they don’t believe anything more likely to work is available. (Actually, the products which have the most pronounced ‘effect’ on the cold are pain killers, decongestants and antihistamines, but they aren’t ‘curing’ anything. They’re just relieving symptoms, and are welcome because of that.)
The formulation of zinc used in most cold products is Zinc Gluconate (a compound two parts gluconate, one part zinc). I walked around the pharmacy the other day looking for a zinc product in the cold and flu aisle not based on Zinc Gluconate; I couldn’t find one. The problem is that the ability of Zinc Gluconate to help is disputed by science. A 2000 systematic review by the Cochrane Library referred to the evidence of benefit as inconclusive. The Harvard Family Health Guide stated in 2001 that one study suggested that “zinc lozenges have little, if any, beneficial effect on the treatment of the common cold.”
So much for zinc in its ability to cure the cold, right? Eby decided not. He decided to try other formulations, and performed a study in 1984 using Zinc Acetate which showed that – bingo! – it reduced the duration of colds by 7 days. Not only that, but a British Medical Survey study supported his conclusions in 1987. Finally, a cure for the common cold!
(Incidentally, ten more studies have since been conducted on Zinc Acetate, and five of them found no benefits. How could this be? Eby went back to work. What he’s found since then is that the beneficial effect was limited to his Zinc Acetate lozenges containing positively charged ions. When the zinc ions were positively charged, they had the effect of significantly reducing the length and severity of the common cold, which explained why some of the studies showed that it didn’t work; they weren’t using the positive-ion formula. In fact, negatively-charged ions had the opposite effect by actually lengthening colds! He took this knowledge, and worked further on the size and dosage of the lozenges for maximum effect, et viola.)
Now, being the smart man Eby is, he immediately patented this precise formulation of positive-ion Zinc Acetate. And, being a scientist rather than a businessman, he had no idea how to market it in the way Airborne (“created by a teacher”) did. The result is that almost nobody knows that his scientifically sound product exists.
When I first read about it, I ordered a big bottle of it from Eby’s website. When I caught my next cold, I followed the directions and noticed that my cold was going away after only about 48 hours of my first symptoms. And ever since, I’ve hit Eby’s zinc every time I’ve caught a cold, meaning that I haven’t missed a day of work due to a cold in years.
Unfortunately, Eby has never been able to get mass production of the lozenges, and only has limited supplies available. So, this remains one of the world’s best-kept secrets.
You’re welcome.
John Wright
Day 3 – No sniffles
Confession 425
Feb 1st
I stood there as they applauded and thanked me for my heroic efforts.
I’ve never felt so bad.
Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate pats on the back as much as the next guy, but this time something was keeping me from fully enjoying the moment.
Guilt.
To understand the reason behind my feeling this way we need to go back…way back to 1993.
Warning: off-road fever alert
Jan 30th
Off-road fever is a debilitating disease that is known to afflict many residents and visitors of the Parker area at this time of year. There’s no known cure, though doctors say it is possible to manage the symptoms this weekend.
What symptoms afflict the patient suffering from off-road fever?
Patients will experience a draw toward areas of open desert; in this respect the sickness manifests in the opposite manner to agoraphobia. Often, patients will be found spending days and nights in the desert near other sufferers of the condition, even being known to sleep there, and often having left perfectly good homes and warm beds in order to do so.
This behavior is supported by a sequence of decisions which allow the symptoms to continue, such as building fires, purchasing beverages and food, and buying frozen water to act as makeshift refrigerators. All of this enables the patient’s primary symptom.
Those afflicted with the most extreme cases of off-road fever have it even worse. Those with ‘aggravated off-road fever’ experience a need to move at high speeds through aforementioned desert areas, and will go to great lengths to indulge this feeling. The primary manner with which this speed is attained is to sit inside of vehicles which are capable of attaining it. However, such vehicles are not easy to come by, so an entire ecosystem has built up to support the patients’ behavior, including high-performance engines, special tires and suspension systems.
In the past quarter-century, off-road fever has become more extreme. Large numbers of patients gather together and manifest their symptoms collectively, bringing all sorts of equipment and transportation, including their ‘race’ vehicles and sometimes helicopters, with them. These events are recorded and played back by the patients later, when possible, all aimed at scratching the itch.
This weekend, one such manifestation is set to occur in Parker, Arizona. Residents and visitors should be aware that off-road fever is contagious. Persons not yet affected are at high risk of becoming afflicted. Look out for these early signs of infection:
- Interest in getting off asphalt or other hard surfaces.
- Enjoyment of the odor of gasoline or engine exhaust.
- Expressions of a desire to go to a ‘driver’s meeting’.
- Expressions of a desire to see ‘Contingency’ or ‘Tech.’
- Outfitting one’s road vehicle with all-terrain tires.
- Experiencing pleasure from airborne dust.
Off-road fever appears to be incurable, and many who have caught it have never found relief. So, patients and their caregivers are urged to manage the symptoms safely this weekend. Don’t indulge them too much.
The health of the southwestern U.S. is at stake.
Quartzsite, Ten Years Ago
Jan 26th
Cate’s Column #19
I landed in Quartzsite January 10, 2002. At 41 and a brand new full time RVer, I had no idea what I was doing. Thwarted at my first — and last — attempt to camp in an RV park, I learned that “55+” meant “senior citizens only.” I followed other RVs heading south of Quartzsite and found a sign reading, “Bureau of Land Management — Long Term Visitor Area” without any dumb “55+” logo.
A smiling man wearing a brown vest greeted me warmly. “Howdy! Come on in here, young lady. Welcome to the LTVA.”
I mustered my courage. “C-can I s-stay here?”
“Sure you can! It’s fifty dollars a month or a hundred and twenty for a long term pass good through April 15.”
A month? What if I hate it? “Can I start with one night with full hookups?”
He threw back his head and howled. “You have no idea how often we get that request. No — this area is for boon docking. Dry camping. Is your rig self-contained? Got a generator? Go find a tree you like and park next to it.”
The LTVA pass fit right into my budget. I paid and headed out into the desert.
Within a week the desert disappeared as more and more RVs parked all around me. Hundred thousand dollar rigs turned into off-road vehicles as people jockeyed for camping space. Soon driving into Quartzsite became impossible and I walked everywhere.
One day I walked into a restaurant and waited patiently for a table. The dining room was crowded and every diner sported the same curly white hairstyle. Menus were stacked on the counter and I read one while waiting. A waiter appeared, pulled the menu from my hands, handed it to the poodle heads behind me and led them to a table.
What? Restaurants are “55+” too?
Fine! I walked over to Lamm’s Produce and bought some delicious avocados and a loaf of fresh wheat bread. My lunch was wonderful. I basked in the warm sunshine and decided I was pretty lucky. This “55+” attitude was going to save me a lot of money!
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Cate Mueller is a web designer, editor, reporter and photographer in Bouse, Arizona. To visit her website, click here.
My morning at the Social Security Office
Jan 24th
Recently I had to get my Social Security card replaced. This process is free, but awfully time consuming. It should be mentioned that the Social Security office in Parker is only open on Mondays and staffed by just one person. This brave soul traveled from Needles to assist a mob of people with issues ranging from basic questions to complicated filing for benefits. In fact, of the fifty plus people I saw come in and out that day about 25% of them had issues that could have easily been handled online.
Now it would’ve been easy to become impatient and allow the wait to get the better of me (I witnessed this take place in the seat behind me), but instead I chose to post my observations on Facebook. This helped to pass the time and what I found was a smörgåsbord of humor.
9:30am
It’s a cloudy morning as I wait outside the Parker Public Library. The door to the Social Security Office opens and we all rush in. There’s a mad dash to the table where the number box awaits. I grab a number, find a seat, and await my turn. Let the observations begin!
*Contrary to initial reports it is possible to squeeze 50 people into a closet-like space.
*Some people aren’t that sly when “Picking a Wedgie”.
*The woman in front of me is reading a romance novel and breathing heavily.
Women and children first?
Jan 23rd
“Male passengers were pushing ahead of women and children.”
So observed retired police chief inspector Ed Gurr disapprovingly after he and his wife Liz made it successfully off the sagging Costa Concordia on January 13th. They were joined by the vast majority of the vessel’s other occupants, including the captain of the ill-fated cruise liner, who is either destined to be regarded as one of the most prolific cowards of maritime history for his decision to abandon the ship before all aboard were safe, or was telling the truth to an exasperated coastguard when he claimed to have been ‘catapulted’ from the Concordia (albeit landing in a convenient rescue boat).
Allegations of cowardice are certainly stewing viciously in the wake of this disaster, which may claim up to 29 lives. But how cowardly can we judge the male passengers who boarded lifeboats ahead of women and children to have been? Does the oft-cited decree of the high seas prioritizing the female of the species and their children hold up today? Helping children to safety would seem to go without saying. Such is the proper role of the parent, guardian or nearby adult without whom many children may not survive at all. But we might pause longer to consider our consignment of women to the same category.
Perhaps to do so is an example of that sloppily transposed set of medieval military values called chivalry, which historically informs us of the ideal qualifications for knighthood. By ensuring that the women are safe, the actions of the men are seen as courageous and noble and, like a soldier who is willing to die in battle, his honor is ultimately viewed as being more valuable than was his life.
This is not, we should admit, a very easy transposition. For a start, there’s no objective reason that the life of a woman should be viewed as being of greater value than that of a man. Nor is it proper that his honor should be judged by how quickly he was able to circumvent his innate survival instincts in her favor (which, it may be argued, are themselves an expression of the highest value we know: survival, without which humanity would not exist today to argue about it).
