skatha

The only pipelines that seem to be funded recently are pipelines for tar sands unfortunately. Reality is, as people move from rural areas to urban ones, the ultimate "fix" for a possibly persistant change from mildly dry with wet in the SE section to all over dry will be desalinization plants on the coast. The LNG terminals that oil companies want to build will require millions of gallons of seawater to operate anyway-I can see some of the effluent being diverted inland

I had a friend in residency that didn't want to move from NW Houston to Galveston so she rented an efficiency during the week and went home, when she could, on the weekends. The rent on the apartment could be considered a business expense if you itemize, so save the documentation. We've seen episodes of mass unemployment like we have now throughout American history. If you have a skill we don't need anymore, like steel mill worker, or assembly line manufacturing, or even computer hardware assembly, you will find yourself unemployed at sometime in your life. The trick is to figure out a job that will always be needed. A hot job need now and forever is electricians, plumbers, mechanics, high capacity AC, etc..... Obviously, the fact you weren't unemployed very long means you have skills still needed. My brother, conversely, was a PR director at a theater. When he got laid off-for the third time in his life-he realized that would be the story of his career. He now works as a financial planner for Fidelity-he used his unemployment to take classes. He was unemployed for a year, BTW. I'd love to be able to spend my free time on the snow-here in Helltown, we just have pictures of snow to enjoy.

Where's the snow? Here...we actually had a flash flood warning 2 days ago and numerous road closures due to high water. We've actually had our expected monthly rainfall totals every month since October. Of course, Houston finished 2011 with only 25 inches of rain (half our yearly average of 49), so the fact the last 3 months had our expected rainfall is a testament as to how dry it was prior to October. The rain late didn't save the pine trees that died in my neighborhood (about 1/3 of them) nor the trees I see driving to work (about 1/2 of them). The legislature is considering several billion dollars of reservoir work for future droughts and I'm sure Perry will beg the federal government he hates so much to pay for it. The state climatologist mentioned our increasing population and projected warmer temps (getting Perry to admit climate change exists is like Fonzie saying the word "wrong") with the proposal....Ce la Vie:smashfrea

I read that she needed to be resuscitated after the fall-this is not a good sign. Most people don't survive if resuscitation needs to be done and it makes me wonder if she didn't break her neck on impact. I've seen plenty of people die-usually with a brain injury, death is not instantaneous (excepting gun shot wounds, of course). High cervical spine fractures, tho---C1 or C2---it is

Gluten intolerance is marked by diarrhea-not anaphylaxis......just my $0.02 as a board certified general internist.... As a resident of TX, thanks for the laugh regarding chili and/or breakfast burritos!

I have a teal/magenta/purple parka from Columbia-it's still in great shape and I got it in 1988....it helps that, being in Texas, I rarely have to wear it....

There's 2 Pontiac Tempests listed on ebay motors....

Disagree completely...Epicski is definitely too smug to give advice. A similar question would have been met with nothing but derision, as well

Helmets should be considered to be like sunscreen.....something that mitigates but doesn't remove the risk of injury. The threshold of fatal brain injury is a fall that achieves the velocity of 12 mph-sounds ridiculous, I know, but one of my first patients suffered a fatal brain injury sliding off the back of a moped accelerating from a stop. If the helmet adds 10 mph to that threshold, it'll protect 95% of riders. It's all statistics, guys. Kevin fell outside the parameters of what the helmet was designed to protect....

Don't be surprised if you have a redo surgery in the next few years, then...

Ever wonder why West Virginia is considered part of the south but actually remained in the Union during the time of the Civil War?

Back in the day, we used to have to do layered closures to reconstruct the inguinal canal. The surgery required 6 week healing time, mainly because that was the time needed for the tissues to regain 95% of the tensile strength they had prior to the surgery. The suture material is not that strong-I broke a strand of 0 vicryl with my hands one day to demonstrate to a 17 year old kid why he needed to take 6 weeks off of football. Nowadays, they position a mesh over the hole laparoscopically and staple it in. Would I still recommend taking 6 weeks off? Yes, the mesh/staple combo is not as strong as the scar that's going to form over it with time. I'd let that scar form if I were you. I think that too many surgeons are recommending too short of a time to recover and not thinking about wound strength issues. Just my $0.02....

Sorry, I met a victim of the alpine slide at WP one summer. He did wipeout once the sliding pad got out from underneath him and he nearly tore his ear off.....lots of nice stitching although I would have used prolene...

Not true....the fatality rate has dropped 30%, adjusted for population.

Remember skis used to be wood planks....I found this, modern wood skis without metal edges....

I can tell you the difference in the last 20 years from working in the ER. The likelihood that you would die in your auto accident was much higher when I was a surgery resident. I routinely see people now brought in by EMS who were ambulatory on the scene of fairly horrific accidents-rollovers, T-bones, etc. Note-the narrator of the controlled crash did not bring up the nontelescoping steering wheel of the 59 BelAir. Many drivers got impaled by their steering wheels back in the day. You can clearly see how the rigid steering wheel juts straight up in the crash from the BelAir view. I also see people with burns on their forearms from the explosive charge that inflates the air bag. When they complain, I tell them it's much better than dealing with facial fractures from the radio knobs, which I've seen, too

LOL-about the Mac comment. When a OS has less than 7% of the personal computer market, why would hackers bother? Mac ain't where the money is... Forget McAfee or Norton, hackers write programs knowing those programs' weakness. In fact, I once had a software engineer tell me that McAfee and Norton programmers moonlight with hacker groups. I have a two-fold guard, a good browser with a popup blocker and dual security programs. I have far more spam from FB. Of course, the gold mine of spam was the day I was stupid enough to answer a Newsmax.com poll! As for BOL-never any spam. In fact, I would guess your possible BOL spam may be actually through the "mind reading magic" of Google or Google Chrome... Be safe out there-the internet is one big data mining shopping mall nowadays

Gotta step in on this one. There was a time that the majority of airline pilots were former military ones. Only officers could fly the planes and only college grads could be officers. Now, there are plenty of airline pilots who have no military experience. I imagine that, before too long, there will be airline pilots who've not gone to college. When it comes to maintenance, unfortunately, most airlines now contract with agencies that operate in third world countries, so, good luck getting maintenance done with someone who has any education. But, prior to the big move of maintenance facilities out of the country, one of my patients gave up a white collar job to work for Continental as a mechanic. He had a MBA but loved fixing 737s more. LOL on the list tho!

Nobody calls you about bad food, they just wait for a call from the lawyer your next of kin hired

There's been 640,000 people participate since BoA mentioned increasing debit card fees in September. The movement caused BoA to drop their plan and to prevent other banks from following suit.... 6 banks hold 66% of the nation's GDP As for the 1%, they hold that money in the form of stocks (the financial sector went from 6% to 16% of the GDP after the Bush tax cuts), as well as nonliquid forms like real estate. Lower the holdings of a bank like BoA and the stock price drops....but, I agree with your statement, the end result of the corporate protectionism that our government and society has advocated for decades is market consolidation and less consumer choice as well as reduced entrepreneuralism. It's a "which evil company do I want to support less" rather than a situation like we had in the 70s when consumer pressure actually resulted in a change of business practices

11/5 is the day to move your money out of Wells Fargo, Bank of America, et al., if you are so inclined

We've lost anywhere from 10-20% of the loblolly pines trees in the neighborhood this summer. Many people are having them removed. They average 50 feet in height, so I'm looking up for tree removal guys, topping off dead trees

When my son was 3, I'd used to hand him the phone. He'd walk around the house babbling into the phone:biggthump Now my fax machine is hooked up to the phone line:eplus2:

I'm always amazed how frequently these "libertarian" types want laws enacted to make their lives more convenient. Oops, I guess you are only a libertarian when it comes to legislating YOUR behavior. Speaking as an ER doc who's actually had to declare people dead from motor vehicle accidents, I take a bit of a different perspective-it's called the Serenity Prayer. I use it when I'm driving in adverse conditions with people less careful and less capable than me on the road.

Skiblades are a great way to teach your kid to snowboard. They are really maneuverable and you don't need poles to skate around. Plus, being twintipped, there's no problem snowplowing backerds while observing your grom catch a toeside and faceplant. For regular shredding, tho.... I had some at one time. I used them for one season. They are good for groomed greens and that's about it-even a little chop is bad