Shop at the Museum: The Well-Edited V&A
The newly stocked and themed shop at London's Victoria and Albert Museum has a wide variety of items that are inexpensive, light in tone and weight as well as, well, just fun. We bought small items for almost every member of the family at this shop recen…
Shopping for Home and Body: Iris Hantverk: How to Brush With Style
While at Liberty's bath shop in London we came across this line of brushes for cleaning and bath purposes. They were so appealing that we were delighted to find one for ourselves as well as grandchildren.
Craft in America, Part Two, a Virtual Look
"From Eastern shipwrights to Navajo weavers; from those who work with needles to those who work with sledgehammers, from saddlemakers and banjo-builders to the potter who’s ‘always praying over the kiln’."
Are Thousands Dying from a Lack of Health Inurance? FactCheck.org Examines the Question
A 2004 study published in the journal Health Affairs looked at data for those age 55 to 64 in the Health and Retirement Survey. It controlled for socioeconomic factors and found the uninsured in the group had a 3 percent higher risk of dying over an eight-year period. The study called uninsurance the third leading cause of death for that age group, saying that more than 13,000 yearly deaths "may be attributable to the present lack of insurance coverage among the near-elderly.
JAMA's Study of Online Posting of Unprofessional Content by Medical Students
Violations of patient confidentiality were reported by 13% (6/46). Student use of profanity (52%; 22/42), frankly discriminatory language (48%; 19/40), depiction of intoxication (39%; 17/44), and sexually suggestive material (38%; 16/42) were commonly reported.
Women Winemakers: Big House's Good-Value Selection Grows with Georgetta Dane at the Helm
“Our goal,” according to Georgetta Dane, “is to trumpet the many underappreciated Mediterranean varieties that express such a rich and varied array of aromas and flavors.”
Cemetery Chronicles
As a young woman, I had the good fortune to accompany my father and his life-long friend on a walk through our hometown cemetery. The warm summer evening, with the sun casting long shadows behind the grave stones, made me feel that life might never end, even though the location insisted otherwise.
Relaxing to the Internet
When asked whether they used the internet to relax and help get their minds off of the recent economic or financial problems, three-quarters (74%) of online economic users said they had done so.
Medicare Investigates Misleading Mailings
"We are concerned that, among other things, the information in the letter is misleading and confusing to beneficiaries, who may believe that it represents official communication about the Medicare Advantage program."
New Pew Report: Recession Turns a Graying Office Grayer
The Pew Research Center released a report September 3 noting two distinct trends in the labor force: older adults are working longer, and younger adults are waiting longer to start working.
The SEC's OIG Investigation on Madoff
The complaint submitted in 2005 was entitled "The World's Largest Hedge Fund is a Fraud" and detailed approximately 30 red flags indicating that Madoff was operating a Ponzi scheme, a scenario it described as "highly likely."
Study of Women's Health Across the Nation (SWAN)
In addition to addressing coronary health, a paper entitled Sexual Functioning and Practices in a Multi-Ethnic Study of Midlife Women addresses women as they approach and begin the menopausal transition. There has been much debate on the relative impact of menopause on sexual activity.
History by the Thimbleful
Managing to clothe eight children on a clergyman’s tiny salary must have been quite a feat. Mind you, this was in the days when mothers had to: (a) draw water from a creek or, if they were lucky, from a well; (b) cook on a wood stove, and keep the fire burning because it also heated the lower floor of the house; (c) wash clothes, including diapers, by hand; (d) wash and dry dishes for ten people and often more, by hand; (e) iron with a sod iron that was heated by setting it on the top of the stove, no thermostatic controls; (f) teach the younger children to read and write and cipher, when her husband was assigned to a remote posting where there were no schools; and (g) make or remake clothing for all members of the family.
Shop for Home (and tunics!): Angela Adams
The rugs are as beautiful as before (as seen in the Birds and the Bees collection) and the furniture stylish, such as the Lily dressing table, Seabird Sidecase and Pod screens. Trays, pillows, glasses, paper goods, handbags, fine art prints and yes, tunics.
The Hidden Art of Fore-Edge Book Painting
"By the sixteenth century, a Venetian artist, Cesare Vecellio, devised a way to enhance the beauty of a book by painting on its edges. The images, mostly portraits, were easily viewed when the covers of the book were closed. A century later in England, Samuel Mearne, a bookbinder to the royal family, developed the art of the 'disappearing painting' on the fore-edge of a book."
Financial Markets and Real People
"Now, part of this theme of democratization of finance is that we have to pay respect to behavioral finance. That's because people don't - especially the less educated or less capable people - don't always make optimal use of financial instruments like, for example, insurance. If people don't make use of risk management contracts, then we have a problem."
Nancy (Drew, that is) and Me
her doting father, a successful lawyer, never seemed to question her questionable activities — or ask, “How come you’re not in college?” or “Isn’t it time you got a job?” or demand that she be home by ten. He never scolded her about not cleaning her room either because the Drews’ wonderful housekeeper did all the chores. (No hanky-panky between her and Mr. Drew either).
Books and Authors Worth Revisiting: Islandia By Austen Tappan Wright
The outstanding characteristic of Islandia is that it will leave no reader unmoved, or even untouched. To make your way through this tour de force of imagination will change you, according to what aspect of it touches you most closely.
When Does the Greed Stop?
"What is it about working men and women that you find so offensive?"
Twenty-six Lies About H.R. 3200
A notorious analysis of the House health care bill contains 48 claims. Twenty-six of them are false and the rest mostly misleading. Only four are true.
The FBI Issues A Reverse Mortgage Fraud Report
They facilitate appraisal fraud by arranging for minor cosmetic repairs, or falsely documenting repairs, that were never performed to inflate the appraisal. They also fraudulently create fictitious loans and liens that enable them to distribute the loan proceeds to themselves, the straw buyer, and others at closing.
CultureWatch, August 2009
Duchess of Death tells of Agatha Christie's travels with her husband on Middle East digs, to sleep in a tent or on a desert floor, hardly usual in a woman “to the manor born.” Dreaming in French thrives on the gossipy, ex-pat society of Paris. Drawing in…
Phineas Staunton's Painting of Henry Clay Returns to the Senate
"It was reserved for Mr. Clay to eclipse them all...there was a fascinating grandeur and charm in his eloquence that was simply indescribable, and that...could never be equaled."
Senator Ted Kennedy on Health Care Reform: "A Right, Not a Privilege"
"For me, this is a season of hope, new hope for a justice and fair prosperity for the many and not just for the few, new hope. And this is the cause of my life, new hope that we will break the old gridlock and guarantee that every American - north, south…
EPI Snapshot: Basic Truths About the Deficit
The Economic Policy Institute has released a copyrighted newsletter entitled: Straight talk on the federal budget deficit.A few paragraphs:
"Some little-known facts about the federal budget deficit: It grew slower than was expected just a few months…
