www.FireSafety.gov

Have you thought of what you would do in case of a fire? Do you have copies of insurance papers, do you have photos documenting your belongings, do you have copies of all your critical legal documents? We all put it off because it is so unpleasant...but it would be more unpleasant if you had the opportunity to plan for the worst, didn't and the worst happened.

Here's some helpful info...

I googled fire saftey and recommend this site: wwwFireSafety.gov which includes information provided by theCenters for Disease Control and Prevention,the Consumer Product Safety Commissionand the U.S. Fire Administration.


Here's a quick snapshot of what's on the website:
Get a Smoke Alarm
Make an Escape Plan
Practice Fire Safety
Residential Fire Sprinklers
What to Do After a Fire Statistics

Also - - you might not be aware of all the various causes of fire....it's not just wildfires that we have to guard against.
Risk of Cooking-Related Fires Doubles on Thanksgiving Day; Safety Guidelines for Using a Turkey Fryer (PDF, 564 Kb, Adobe Acrobat PDF Help)

PC Notebook Computer Batteries Recalled Due to Fire and Burn Hazard (10/30/2008)

Ghost Tealight Holders Recalled by Trade Associates Group and Crate & Barrel Due to Fire and Burn Hazard (10/29/2008)

Serta International Recalls Mattresses Due to Violation of Federal Mattress Flammability Standard (10/28/2008)

Lastly, if you want to volunteer - do not let policy and procedures of non profits deter you. Although the Red Cross does great work - I do not agree with their policy on requiring training before accepting volunteers during a crisis or their policy on no dropping-off of clothes, blankets etc. (call us and we might accommodate your interest in helping is so off-putting to me.) For those intersted in taking immediate action - just do it! There are plenty of organizations that would love your help!

California Wildfires & the Mt. Calvary Monastery

Southern California has been hit again - first with the Montecito fires 2 days ago, Sylmar yesterday and Anaheim Hills today. Hundreds of houses of burned to the ground and over 10,000 people have been temporarily displaced.

Today when I walked outside in the sunshine, sunlight was filtered taking on a hauntingly beautiful quality. Air smelled of smoke and I found it harder to breath. White ash wafted back down to earth like snowflakes and I decided it was better to be indoors. Who knows what you might be inhaling...Apparently there was a small fire in Palos Verdes this afternoon that I didn't know about until my (curtailed) evening walk.

I am particularly sorry to hear that the Mt. Calvary Monastery completely burned to the ground. The monks provided spiritual retreats to individuals and groups. I visited many years ago - and was struck at the warmth and hospitality of the monks. The mountaintop sanctuary was breaktaking with its panaromic view of the Santa Barbara Coastline. The retreat house itself was a Spanish style house built in the 1920's that housed Spanish colonial masterpieces, Navajo blankets, wonderful books in their library - what a loss. Very little survived the fire - the large iron cross in the garden and a fraction of the beautiful mural at the entry way.

Here's their website: http://www.mount-calvary.org/visit.htm

Sonar, the Navy and Whales

It is very unfortuante that the government is allowing the Navy to use sonar....

Here's an except from an interesting article: Dissenting judge Ruth Ginsburg further said the navy had failed to obey the law by not supplying a full report on the environmental risks before beginning to use sonar, and just sticking to its preliminary report. At the start of the Supreme Court hearing in October, government lawyer Gregory Carre acknowledged that a preliminary navy study found that sonar could disorient 170,000 marine mammals, and leave 8,000 whales temporarily deaf.

Drilling, sonar, sewage negatively impact our own ecosystem. I did a google search to see what individuals, groups or countries are doing to help the environment in which we all live I am impressed by Tunisia's environmental policy which reads... (www.tunisiaonline.com/culture/index.html)

Tunisia's environmental policy aims to preserve the ecological balance, safeguard natural and human resources, and control all forms of pollution. It also seeks to reconcile development needs with environmental imperatives in order to protect natural elements (air, water, soil, and biodiversity), reduce existing risks to such resources, and improve the living conditions of the population.

It is notable I did not find such a policy for the U.S. but there are plenty of articles on sonar use harming wildlife.

NRDC: Protecting Whales from Dangerous Sonar
International campaign to regulate active sonar systems that harm marine mammals.www.nrdc.org/wildlife/marine/nlfa.asp - Cached
Whales Index Page - NRDC's BioGems
NRDC BioGems page to save whales and other marine mammals. ... Ear-splitting military sonar is needlessly threatening whales and other marine ...www.savebiogems.org/whales -
Is Navy Sonar Killing Whales? Holology by Freydis
This report studies the connections between Navy active-sonar and reports of whale deaths. ... sonar system could have caused a mass stranding of whales off ...www.holology.com/whale.html
Orca Network - News - Navy Sonar Blasts Whales
The Orca Network Lolita campaign: Enhancing awareness of a captive member of the Southern Resident ... US Navy Sonar blasts Pacific Northwest killer whales ...www.orcanetwork.org/news/shoup.html - 77k - Cached
Whale - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Pathology: whales, sonar and decompression sickness". Nature 428 (6894) ... "Sonar versus whales: noise may disrupt neural activity in deep-diving cetaceans" ...en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whale - 68k - Cached
Sonar May Be Linked to Stranding of Whales LiveScience
The Navy's use of sonar during maritime exercises may have contributed to the mass stranding of more than 150 whales in Hawaii's Hanalei Bay two years ago, ...www.livescience.com/animals/ap_060428_sonar_whales.html - Cached

Shake, Rattle & Roll - Earthquake hits California

About a 15 mninutes ago, I felt the earth move under my feet. An earthquake. The whole building shook and I could hearing creaking followed by a punctuation. Some item from the loft upstairs - either something fell off the bookshelf or the wall had fallen. The rolling movement stopped thankfully.

Do you know what to do in case of an earthquake? If not, check out the Red Cross website.


Here's what was posted on the Internet a minute ago.

By ROBERT JABLON, Associated Press Writer 1 minute ago
LOS ANGELES - A strong earthquake shook Southern California on Tuesday, causing buildings to sway and triggering some precautionary evacuations. No immediate damage was reported.
Preliminary information from the U.S. Geological Survey estimated the quake at magnitude 5.8, centered 29 miles east-southeast of downtown Los Angeles near Chino Hills in San Bernardino County.

The quake struck at 11:42 a.m. PDT. "It was dramatic. The whole building moved and it lasted for a while," said Los Angeles County sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore, who was in the sheriff's suburban Monterey Park headquarters east of Los Angeles.

California is one of the world's most seismically active regions. More than 300 faults crisscross the state, which sits atop two of Earth's major tectonic plates, the Pacific and North American plates. About 10,000 quakes each year rattle Southern California alone, although most of them are too small to be felt.