Literarily Speaking ? Guest Blogger: Writing on the Toilet by Michael ...

Writing on the Toilet

by Michael Reilly

My recently published novel, Fresh Heir, is about parenting. More specifically, the book explores the often overlooked paradox that our children have as much to teach us as we have to teach them. This theme can be assessed from a broad symbolic perspective, but it can also be extended into a discussion about practical, day-to-day matters.

Many parents would agree that one practical lesson we can learn as a father or mother is how to better manage our time. Without this skill, we?d be overwhelmed. Some of us learn it better than others, I suppose. My advice to any parent who wants to write (particularly one with small children) is you better learn it.

Perhaps more than managing your time (which sounds so ?corporate?), is learning to ?go with the flow.? (No, I?m not ready to talk about toilets yet.) Unless you learn to go with the flow, weeks?months?years will pass you by and your page will still be blank?your story left untold.

It?s tempting to dream about devising the perfect conditions that will inspire you and ignite all your creative juices. But for busy parents, the word ?juice? more likely ignites only thoughts of having to go to the grocery store for the fourth time in a week, or of those nasty stains on the ceiling from when your son?s bratty little friend intentionally squeezed a Juicy Juice box and it shot through the straw all over the room.

As much as we refuse to admit it, a sinister voice deep in our head longs for those days when the kids are gone, and we can perhaps convert one of their bedrooms into a cozy little sanctuary to pursue our artistic ambitions. Go ahead, admit it right now. Say out loud: ?I sometimes (maybe lots of times) can?t wait until they?re gone.? Alrighty, now that you?ve got that out of your system, it?s time to get real. What follows is some advice for those people who want to write and still remain parents. For those of you who?d no longer prefer to remain parents, I have no use for you here. Just stay out of jail.

This is not going to be a ?list? of things you can do, like ten tips or something like that. It?s just one thing. And here it is: Don?t wait for a good time to write. There will never be one. Write wherever you are. Write no matter what you?re doing. And write all the time. Fine, that could qualify as three tips.

When I was writing Fresh Heir, I remember composing bits and pieces of it all over the place. I was constantly playing the story out in my head, reworking characters, and coming up with new ideas no matter where I was. I?d scribble down notes on tiny pieces of paper while in line at the store; I?d peck out emails to myself at red lights; or I?d record memos on my phone while coaching lacrosse practice. One time I even wrote some ideas on the rim of our toilet with a Sharpie.

OK, I didn?t actually do that, but there were several times I?d ?write? things in my head while I was in the bathroom. Let?s be honest, parents, there is no better refuge from the bedlam of family life than the bathroom, right? I mean, it?s one place where you can escape and tell the kids to leave you alone for a few minutes, and they just might listen (applicable only for children ages 3 and up, of course).

Ultimately, you will need to sit at a computer. I realize that. At some point you?ve got to execute the mechanics of writing. But that process will be so much more effective if you?ve already composed what you are about to type.? You can?t just expect to sit down, start fresh, and have all the time in the world to become inspired. As it is, you?re likely going to have to get up very early or stay up very late to get in your computer time. Trust me, that coveted opportunity will be much more productive if you have already done the work some time and some place else. Otherwise, you might just waste the opportunity staring bleary-eyed at the screen, while you whiff your keyboard trying to deduce the flavor of the sticky prints all over it.

I would love to hear from other parents about any advice they have on mixing parenting and writing. Maybe we can turn this into ?ten tips.?

Michael Reilly is a writer and entrepreneur. He earned a bachelor?s degree in history from Yale University and a master?s degree in journalism from Columbia University. His first published novel, Fresh Heir, was released in May 2011. He is also founder and chief executive officer of FitDivs Inc, a company that promotes and rewards healthy living. Michael resides with his wife and four children in Charlottesville, VA.

More information on Fresh Heir can be found on the book?s website at FreshHeirNovel.com

Michael Reilly is a writer and entrepreneur. He earned a bachelor?s degree in history from Yale University and a master?s degree in journalism from Columbia University. His first published novel, Fresh Heir, was released in May 2011. He is also founder and chief executive officer of FitDivs Inc, a company that promotes and rewards healthy living. Michael resides with his wife and four children in Charlottesville, VA.

You can visit his website at www.freshheirnovel.com or connect with him on Facebook at www.facebook.com/pages/Fresh-Heir/168240473246308.

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Source: http://literarilyspeaking.net/2011/09/05/guest-blogger-writing-on-the-toilet-by-michael-reilly/

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9/11 causes cancer ? RT

Early morning light illuminates the wreckage of the World Trade Center (AFP Photo / Eric FEFERBERG)

It took a decade, but doctors are now confirming that firefighters that responded to Ground Zero during the September 11 terrorist attacks have a higher risk of getting cancer.

The latest study published by Dr David Prezant of the New York City Fire Department says that firefighters that were exposed to the dust and smoke that came from the collapse of the Twin Towers have a 19 percent higher risk of getting various types of cancer than their peers that were not on the scene.

Cancer-causing toxins including polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, polychlorinated biphenyls and dioxins have all been identified as agents apparent at Ground Zero. In his findings, Dr. Prezant explicitly writes that "This study clearly shows World Trade Center exposure in these firefighters led to an increase in cancer.? He analyzed data from nearly 10,000 male firefighters before coming to his conclusion.

Only two months ago the National Institute for Occupation Safety and Health published that they could not link first responders that aided on 9/11 with cancer, much to the chagrin of countless firefighters that have since seen their colleagues succumb to various forms of the disease. Upon the publishing of that paper, firefighter Kenneth Specht told the Daily News, "Every time we bury a New York City firefighter: Cancer. Cancer. Cancer.? Specht himself has been fighting a battle with thyroid cancer in the decade since 9/11.

Firefighters have been waiting for a study to finally link 9/11 with cancer, as those suffering have been unable to collect health insurance benefits as medical officials have been unable to show a correlation until now. The James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act has covered illnesses such as asthma but could not find a correlation between cancer and exposure to the aftermath of the terrorist attacks. Dr James Melius of the New York State Laborers' Health Fund now says that Dr Prezant?s study supports the addition of cancer to some federally funded compensation, reports Reuters.

The latest study looks at cancers that developed up until 2008 and took into account several factors, including ethnicity and age, to insure that results would not be skewed. Prezant concluded from his findings that an increased risk in developing several types of cancer can be linked to firefighters that were at the scene, as he did not limit his research to any one type of cancer.

Following the release of that initial document in July, several members of Congress issued a statement that they believed in time doctors would be able to link toxins at Ground Zero with cancer. At the time they said that the announcement would not be the last word in the study and have remained hopeful since.

Prezant?s study was published in September 3 edition of The Lancet, a medical journal out of the UK.

Source: http://rt.com/usa/news/cancer-study-911-september11/

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Obama moves jobs speech to September 8 (Reuters)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) ? President Barack Obama on Wednesday agreed to unveil new jobs proposals in an address to Congress on September 8, bowing to pressure from Republicans, who objected to the original date set for his high-profile speech.

Obama's long-awaited proposals could set the agenda in Washington for the coming months, but his preferred date of September 7 had an unpalatable political edge for the opposition party: Republican presidential candidates were scheduled to hold a televised debate on the same evening, at the same time.

Thus began a new round of conflict between the Democratic president and Republicans in Congress.

The White House said the timing of the Republican debate and Obama's proposed speech -- announced in a letter to congressional leaders -- was a coincidence.

But Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner asked Obama to come on Thursday instead of Wednesday, and the White House agreed.

"Both houses (of Congress) will be back in session after their August recess on Wednesday, September 7th, so that was the date that was requested," White House spokesman Jay Carney said in a statement. "We consulted with the Speaker about that date before the letter was released, but he determined Thursday would work better.

The new date could have its own complications.

The season-opening NFL football game between Wisconsin's Green Bay Packers and Louisiana's New Orleans Saints will air at 8:30 p.m. EDT the same night on the NBC network, and many Americans would likely tune into that rather than watch an address by the president if they are at the same time.

The timing of the speech has yet to be determined.

"We appreciate the president working with us tonight and look forward to hearing his new proposals," said Brendan Buck, a Boehner spokesman.

Obama said in his letter to congressional leaders he would use the address to lay out job-boosting proposals that members of both parties could support.

"As I have traveled across our country this summer and spoken with our fellow Americans, I have heard a consistent message: Washington needs to put aside politics and start making decisions based on what is best for our country and not what is best for each of our parties in order to grow the economy and create jobs," Obama said in the letter.

"We must answer this call."

BACK AND FORTH

The speaker's office raised no objection to the time and date when the White House first proposed it on Wednesday morning, a White House official said. Buck said Boehner's office never signed off on the original date.

The House and the Democratic-controlled Senate must pass a joint resolution to provide for Congress to assemble for Obama's remarks. Lawmakers get back to work in Washington on September 7 after their summer recess and start votes at 6:30 p.m. EDT (2230 GMT). Boehner cited such parliamentary "impediments" when asking for the date change.

The back-and-forth led to criticism from both parties.

"People die and state funerals are held with less fuss, so the logistics excuse by the Speaker's office is laughable," said one senior Democratic aide.

Republicans saw it differently. Presidential candidate Michelle Bachmann suggested Obama's original proposed timing aimed to distract Americans from watching her party's debate.

"Now does this show maybe a little insecurity on the part of the president?" she said in Iowa.

By seeking a joint session of Congress, much like the president's annual televised State of the Union address, Obama sought a sweeping platform in his opening bid to get support from Democrats and Republicans for his proposals.

But the original timing would have given Obama an opportunity to upstage the other party at the same time that he was seeking its support.

Obama said he would lay out a series of steps that Congress could act on immediately to strengthen small businesses and put "more money in the paychecks of the middle class and working Americans" while reducing the deficit.

Carney said Obama's speech would focus primarily on jobs, with detailed proposals on deficit reduction coming later.

The proposals could include programs to fund infrastructure building, measures to help struggling homeowners, and tax breaks to encourage hiring of new workers.

Business lobby group the U.S. Chamber of Commerce said it was skeptical about a payroll tax holiday to subsidize companies that hire workers.

"Companies don't invest and hire people just because they have more cash," said Martin Regalia, the group's chief economist. "They hire people when they can put those people to work producing a product or a service that they can sell at a profit. That's what they do. And right now the economy isn't presenting that opportunity."

(Additional reporting by Alister Bull, Matt Spetalnick, Jason Lange and Kay Henderson; Editing by Eric Walsh)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/obama/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110901/ts_nm/us_obama_jobs_speech

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Business Marketing and Solutions ? Team Building Venue ? The ...

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Source: http://afomarketing.com/blog/2011/09/02/team-building-venue-the-standards-you-should-contemplate/

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Russia recognizes Libyan rebels as country's govt

FILE - In this Wednesday, July 20, 2011 file photo, Libyan Foreign Minister Abdul-Ati al-Obeidi gets into a car outside the Russian Foreign Ministry, after meeting with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov in Moscow. Libyan rebels have captured Moammar Gadhafi's foreign minister, a rebel official said Thursday. Ahmed Said, an adviser to the interior minister in the rebels' interim government, confirmed that the foreign minister had been captured but he did not identify him by name. A week ago, Gadhafi's Foreign Minister Abdul Ati al-Obeidi told British broadcaster Channel 4 that Gadhafi's 42-year rule was over.(AP Photo/Mikhail Metzel, File)

FILE - In this Wednesday, July 20, 2011 file photo, Libyan Foreign Minister Abdul-Ati al-Obeidi gets into a car outside the Russian Foreign Ministry, after meeting with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov in Moscow. Libyan rebels have captured Moammar Gadhafi's foreign minister, a rebel official said Thursday. Ahmed Said, an adviser to the interior minister in the rebels' interim government, confirmed that the foreign minister had been captured but he did not identify him by name. A week ago, Gadhafi's Foreign Minister Abdul Ati al-Obeidi told British broadcaster Channel 4 that Gadhafi's 42-year rule was over.(AP Photo/Mikhail Metzel, File)

PARIS (AP) ? Russia recognized the Libyan rebel movement as the country's acting leadership Thursday, a key endorsement hours ahead of an international conference seeking to map Libya's future.

The summit in Paris of 60 world leaders and top envoys is also looking to free up billions in frozen Libyan assets worldwide to help the opposition, and reconcile diplomatic differences over the NATO-led airstrike campaign that helped oust iron-fisted leader Moammar Gadhafi.

The meeting is the first international gathering for the rebel-backed National Transitional Council now that it has taken Tripoli and controls most of Libya, and a test of its readiness to run a country ravaged by months of civil war and decades of dictatorship.

The council is expected to present a detailed list of requests at the conference, which comes 42 years to the day after Gadhafi seized power in a coup. It may seek short-term loans from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, U.S. officials said. While they do not want international peacekeepers, the rebels may seek a civilian U.N. police presence, they said.

While the United States and many European countries abandoned Gadhafi and recognized the rebels months ago, Russia was among those sharply critical of NATO's military campaign in Libya.

A short statement from the Russian Foreign Ministry on Thursday said it recognized the National Transitional Council. Pressure will now fall on other countries to follow suit ? especially China and Algeria.

China, a big investor in Libya, agreed at the last minute to send an envoy to the Paris conference, and stressed that the United Nations should take a leading role in Libya's future.

Asked about recognizing the rebels, Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu said only that China respects the choice of the Libyan people and attaches importance to the "role played by the National Transitional Council in the settlement of the Libyan issue."

Algeria offered safe haven to Gadhafi's wife and three of his children on Monday, drawing ire from the Libyan rebels. Algerian newspaper El Watan reported, citing unidentified officials in President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's office, said Gadhafi himself also sought refuge across the border but the Bouteflika refused to take his phone calls.

One country notably absent from the meeting is South Africa, which has had ties over the years to Gadhafi and has been critical of the way NATO and key Western powers have handled the Libya situation.

In a state visit to Norway on Thursday, South African President Jacob Zuma said the African Union was undermined in talks over Libya, and criticized Western countries' use of military force that helped the rebels.

Instead of aid for Libya, the financial focus at Thursday's conference will be on unfreezing assets linked to Gadhafi in banks worldwide. The money was blocked by a U.N. resolution earlier this year aimed at persuading Gadhafi to stop his violent crackdown on anti-government protests.

French officials say at least $50 billion linked to Gadhafi is believed to be squirreled away across the world. British officials have put the figure as high as $110 billion. France has received authorization to transfer euro1.5 billion, Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said Thursday.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton hopes to announce in Paris that $1.5 billion in Gadhafi regime assets frozen in the United States have been distributed on behalf of the rebels, U.S. officials said. That money is about half the liquid assets of the more than $30 billion in frozen Libyan assets in the United States.

Summit hosts French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain, two of the most vocal backers of the rebels, are eager for the Libyans themselves to be seen as taking the lead, instead of outside powers.

The transition process "is Libyan-led, this is Libyan-owned, this is not Iraq," British Foreign Minister William Hague said on BBC Radio Thursday.

EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton told reporters in Brussels that the European bloc foresees four areas in which it could help Libya move toward to democracy: immediate humanitarian aid and supplies; security sector reform; economic support ? including the lifting of sanctions; and help in building civil society and democracy.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the first priority is to improve the humanitarian situation, ensuring that hospitals have medicine and people have food and water.

"Libya, because of its oil wealth, doesn't have a money problem," Merkel was quoted as telling the Berliner Morgenpost newspaper. "So our help will be geared more toward building up democracy and infrastructure."

British officials have stressed that Libya's interim government must use Thursday's summit to offer assurances over the timetable toward elections. But Hague indicated there could be flexibility over the National Transitional Council's commitment to hold elections within eight months.

Council leaders Mustafa Abdul-Jalil and Mahmoud Jibril are expected to be among 31 heads of state and government and 11 foreign ministers at the conference, along with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and leaders of NATO, the European Union, African Union, the Arab League, and the 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation.

_____

Jim Heintz in Moscow, Slobodan Lekic in Brussels, Scott McDonald in Beijing, Bjoern H. Amland in Oslo, and Greg Keller, Matthew Lee and David Stringer in Paris contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2011-09-01-EU-Libya-Diplomacy/id-5688ebce14ac4003b2cae02d3f6a4fe5

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VMAs score biggest audience since '93 (AP)

LOS ANGELES ? Between Beyonce's baby bump and Lady Gaga dressed in drag, the Video Music Awards brought MTV its biggest audience since the network has been measuring its viewership.

MTV says its annual show honoring the top music videos attracted 12.4 million viewers Sunday night, a nine percent growth from last year and a network record ? at least since 1993, when Nielsen and MTV began keeping viewership records.

Lady Gaga dressed as her male alter-ego to open the show, where Adele and Katy Perry were the top winners with three trophies each.

But Beyonce overshadowed their performances and prizes with her own silent announcement: The 29-year-old entertainer revealed her pregnancy with husband Jay-Z by cupping her growing belly for photographers as she arrived. Later, after performing on the show, she unbuttoned her jacket and openly rubbed her tummy on stage.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/tv/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110830/ap_en_tv/us_mtv_video_music_awards

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In-Car 956 Movie Downloads | Sung Dollinger

In-Car 956 movie download

Actors:

Derek Bell

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Source: http://eazaad.honmag.com/2011/09/01/in-car-956-movie-downloads/

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