August 2006

When I first heard about Germaine Lawrence on an email group I’m a part of I thought, “What is this? In Arlington, MA? 3 acre campus? They have that much open land there? Nah, can’t be.” I dug into it more and I have to say I was surprised and pleased. I’ve helped troubled adolescent women before and it’s no picnic. I wish I had known about Germaine Lawrence back then, so let me tell you about them so you can know too.

Germain Lawrence is, in their own words:

Germaine Lawrence provides the highest quality residential treatment services in New England for troubled adolescent girls.

We serve girls whose behaviors may include school failure, suicide attempts, cutting, sexually acting out, drug or alcohol abuse, running away, eating disorders, aggression, or firesetting.

Germaine Lawrence provides personalized treatment through comprehensive clinical services, a supportive special education program, and a highly structured therapeutic milieu. We offer a comprehensive continuum of services that helps girls reduce destructive behaviors, develop age-appropriate social skills, and make enough progress to enable them to live at home or in the community safely again.

Sounds like a pretty good deal doesn’t it? Beats seeing your daughter, or your friends daughter or that troubled goth chic at the Starbucks or the super silent preppy girl in class disappear into oblivion. I’ve seen that happen first hand and it makes me cry every time I think of it.

Programs like Germain Lawrence don’t exist on pixie dust though. What they do need is:

• Volunteers
• Donations of stuff
• Money

And you can also help them by doing your searching on GoodSearch. GoodSearch is a Yahoo powered search engine that donates to a charities based on the searches done in a given charities name. When you search using Good Search, and use the Stars in the Nights charity as the designated charity (just type that name into the designated charities box), you are getting the great search results from Yahoo and making a donation to Germain Lawrence through Stars In the Nights. Stars in the Nights charity, for the past two years made sure that all of the 150 girls at Germaine Lawrence received a very nice assortment of gifts (e.g., clothing, CD players, CDs, stationary) during the December holidays.

(photo used courtesy of Cherry Vega Photo, used under Creative Commons License)

There are a number of outstanding updates on the whole area of workplace diversity at the Transgender Workplace Diversity blog site. In the words of the blog’s author, Dr. Jillian Todd Weiss:

This blog is for HR and Diversity professionals who are faced with issues of “transgender workplace diversity.” Here, every working day, I discuss resources, news, and issues of importance specifically for HR and Diversity professionals who need to know the latest on this fast-developing new category of employees.

Some of the new topics covered and well worth a read are:

• Kodak Corporation update trans health beneftis
• West Chester Pennsylvania Council moves gender identity ordinance forward
• Dear Abby weighs in on bathroom question, and what that means to us who are transgender
• Draft Agenda for Co-worker meeting regarding transitioning on the job and giving advice on what to do and how to do it
• Proposed Homeland Security Rules and what the effects could be for you should you transition

Dr. Weiss’s site is choc-a-bloc full of very valuable information on this critical topic for all us workin’ girls and boys - whether you are transitioning or not. Go grab a nice iced cappucino and have a read at the Transgender Workplace Diversity blog by clicking HERE, you’ll be glad you did.

(fish photo courtesy of Greenhem’s Photos, used under license from Creative Commons)

I know two people who had cervical cancer. One caught it early enough and lived. The other did not and died just two weeks ago. I can’t answer why one figured it out somehow and the other did not. Maybe one had regular check-ups and pap smears and the other did not. I just don’t know. But what I do know is that it’s caused by a virus of all things. That virus is HPV.

HPV is short for human papillomavirus. It’s present in both men and women. For men, the risks include anal and penile cancers and genital warts. For women, there is also the risk of genital warts as well as cervical cancer. Cervical cancer is the second leading cause of cancer related deaths among women. The American Cancer Society has determined that 38% of all diagnosed cervical cancer cases will end in death in 2006. A large and very sobering number.

So what to do? Well the most important thing to do is get a regular pap smear. As Merck points out at it’s excellent web site on this subject:

A: Most women learn they have HPV as a result of abnormal Pap tests. A Pap test (also known as a Pap smear) is part of a gynecological exam that can help detect abnormal cells in the lining of the cervix before they have the chance to become precancerous or cervical cancer. Many cases of cervical precancer are related to HPV and can be treated successfully if detected early. It’s also important to note that cervical cancer is one of the most preventable cancers. That’s why it’s really important to follow your doctor’s advice regarding how often you should have a Pap test.
Learn about Pap tests and other follow-up tests.

The keys to prevent or limiting your chance to getting HPV? Either abstain from sex or use condoms to protect both the guy and the girl. And guys, this is a SHARED responsibility - you own this too.

To learn more about the serious dangers on HPV and to get tools to tell others click to Merck’s excellent site on the topic at “Tell Someone“. You can also learn about this silent killer at the Centers for Disease Control site at this link HERE.

“It’s finally happened. My husband has turned into a grumpy old man.” That headline opened a very interesting essay in the June 26, 2006 Wall Street Journal regarding “Cranky Old Men and Happy Old Women”. The well written essay, by Ellen Graham, is about her husband coming to grips with his aging and the differences in their approach to aging. The article made me pause to think about if there is truth behind this, what the implications might be and what do we do about it? I mean, who wants to be cranky all the time? How much fun can that be?

Current research says that men and women are equally happy when they age. The Pew Research Center, released in February 2006, the results of a study on happiness (you can read the report at the Pew site by clicking this link here. A number of areas were covered including gender and aging. In that report they noted that:

There is virtually no difference in happiness by gender and only a bit of variance in happiness by age. But the age data run counter to the prevailing ethos of the popular culture, which is forever extolling the blessings of youth.

I think there are things that seem to always decline with age that can seem to make us cranky. Take our hair for instance. Generally it thins, we lose it, or it changes to white! Ahh, the old gray mare. I much prefer the biblical admonition, “Gray hair is a crown of splendor; it is attained by a righteous life” (Proverbs 16:31). Or how about our memories. “Where did those keys go that I swear I put down on this table”. Had any of those moments lately? But it’s how we deal with them that might best determine how cranky or happy we are as we age. While it appears that women (generally) will roll with such lapses, men (generally) seem to take the decline harder, as a personal affront almost. After years of being forced to fill a role of high performance and competence, men find, as they grow older, they are treated as if they are slipping. They may be perfectly fine and operating at the same levels as years before, but how they are treated makes the difference. The apparent loss of place and status may make them a bit cranky or maybe even make them feel aimless and somewhat hopeless. I wonder how the increasing number of older women executives will deal with this issue since in the work world they are under no less stress to perform.

So perhaps it is all about our attitude then - regardless of gender. A recent interview at the Boost website of Dr. Royda Crose, Ph.D., might help our understanding. Dr. Crose retired from Ball State University in Indiana, where she was director of the Center for Gerontology and associate director of the Fisher Institute for Wellness. She is also author of the book, “Why Women Live Longer than Men, and What Men Can Learn From Them”. In her interview at Boost, she had this to say about attitude and aging:

“Attitude is very important during any phase of life – but particularly as we grow old. For men and women alike, attitude can have a very great impact on health in either a positive or negative way,” she says. “The good news for all of us is that the ability to have a positive attitude is very much under our control. The big question is how you motivate someone to put that positive attitude into action.”

However, even Dr. Crose points out that women seem to have an aging advantage. It’s not related to physical ability, genetics, or mental agility. It seems to be related to experience in life and making lemonades when life hands you lemons. In her excellent review of Dr. Crose’s book, Dr. Joan Saks Berman, Ph.D., notes the following (Dr. Berman’s full and very informitive review can be found at her site here):

Women, on the other hand, have learned coping skills and ways to survive in a sexist society that serve them well in an ageist society. Until men join women as equal partners in all dimensions of life, they won’t succeed in closing the longevity gap. The longevity of a species seems to be based on ability to be open to and to contribute to the well-being of the whole system. Flexibility and resilience seem to be concepts that explain gender differences in longevity. This includes the ability to recover from misfortune and to creatively live life in spite of disease and stress. Flexibility in emotional health means working at finding joy, laughter, and humor in aging life experiences. Flexibility in spiritual or religious beliefs enables the older person to accept the inevitable losses and tolerate the increased diversity encountered in new living environments or in an ever-changing world.

So there really are cranky old men and happy old women and now you know a bit more about why and what to do about it. So whether male or female, there’s no reason to be cranky and unhappy as you age. Both genders can age gracefully and happily. It’s all about your attitude and giving to others in their well being, things all of us can do as we age.

(Photo courtesy of Welfl’s Photos, used under Creative Commons License)

  Well that was a barrel of monkeys! Oy Vei! After getting the quite wonderful Chameleon Theme up and running I upgraded to Wordpress 2.04. Alotta love (booze, and swearing) later it’s all working. Dayum what an effort. Through it I learned about keeping proper backups (which I did), about how to modify Becks’ Cafe MySQL database (which I had to learn), how to hack CSS (not so bad really), and how to get around PHP (a bit different and frustrating but I got it).

So now back to regular posting instead of programming - yay!

(photo of woman elated with Beck’s Cafe running again from Quasimime’s Photos, used under Creative Commons License)

Well we’ve upgraded to the theme Chameleon then hacked that a bit. Then we upgraded to Wordpress 2.04. Everying seemed okay until we tried to order the link list in the right hand side bar. As you can see that didn’t work so great, as the items that are supposed to be last in the list are first. We’re using some Wordpress template tags and the mylinkorder Wordpress plug-in from Geekly Weekly to try and solve this. Results? well, I’m drinking a martini right now so that should give you a hint to the frustration level.

The good news is I’m learning more about coding in Wordpress, html and php. Thanks for your patience kind readers as we get the Cafe back in order.

(Women at Work constuction sign from aheaven’s photos, used via Creative Commons License)

If you’ve been clicking here at the Cafe to check out our fresh content and seemd to see the Cafe’s style change pretty often (especially late at night when we ought to be asleep) it’s due to some Summer renovation work we are doing I did some reading on accesibility and usability in blogs and felt the text area was a bit too wide for easy reading. So I’ve tried to narrow the reading area, keep the links column, make it readable in both Firefox and Internet Explorer and make some small code changes to increase the speed of the blog loading. It’s coming along ok I think, but if something seems amiss or horrible or you just want to drop me a comment on the changes, please do so

Right now I’m experimenting with the Chameleon Theme from Ainslie Johnson, and blog.txt theme from Scott Allan Wallick.

(picture of the two people doing some renovation work from Niklas’ Photos, used under license from Creative Commons)

Being trangender opens up all kinds of opportunities for comedic relief if you relax a bit and just say, “I’m sure I must be insane”. My most recent adventure was one of my most potentially embarrassing while being one that provided the best laughs. Hopefully you’ll be entertained.

First off I’m always “en femme” - I’m always Rebecca and genetically there doesn’t appear to be a whole lot I can do about it aside from a brain transplant. Even then who knows who’s brain I’d get? Teddy Roosevelt? Jeffrey Dallmer? Moe Fine? Groucho Marks? Best to stick with the cortex problems I have than get some other brain with it’s own baggage.

But I dont’ always present as a woman as I’m not “full time” yet, as we say in the community. But hey I prefer to present as “me” as we like to say in the community so when the chance came, I grabbed it thinking, “hey I’ll just change back in the parking garage, no biggie”. I would have been better off changing in a phone booth.

First of all, as most women know, changing clothes in a car is a challenge in itself. How do you get your jeans on when you have a skirt on? Well under the skirt silly then slip the skirt off. Ahhh of course! So here I am in my car, air conditioning on thank goodness, squiggling into my jeans under a perfectly fun skirt that I love that I am hoping desperately I don’t wrinkle, snag, or tear. Mission accomplished there. But the odd gyrations of my portly body in the car would have made a distant on looker wonder if the car I was in was on an earthquake fault: first one leg up against the steering wheel then YANK the jeans up then pull the skirt down then move a hip in the other direction to fit in a bit more. Imagine cramming a sausage full of the sausagy material that makes it so good but doing it by hand. You probably can imagine how I looked. Car swaying, my jeans getting caught over my backside, yanking them up. Good time had by all. Thank goodness there were no spectators - yet.

Removing my bra was no less an act in contorsionism. First unhook said bra then slither your arm out the arm hole then bring it back at an impossible angle so that the arm can actually fit out of the bra strap and then WHISK the bra deftly from your shirt. TA DA. Breasts freed from their imprisonment.

So far so good - piece o’ cake.

Then there’s the makeup. Ahhh the spackle. Some days it might just as well be that. A friend and I had talked earlier about this apparent obstacle, “makeup shmakeup; quick wipe down with a handy makeup removing wipe and be on your way”. On my way indeed! That’s when the spectators came by. As the first man walked past, I figured he wouldn’t notice as I was frantically scrubbing my face. I was right, he was oblivious. A second gentleman saw me from the corner of his eye, then looked away. No doubt he’d seen someone like me scrubbing their face in public before; nothing like a good face scrubbing in public to freshen one up, I’m sure he thought, and on his way he went, nothing unusual here. It was the third couple that got me.

Walking past my car, two women walked up to their oversized white SUV (the kind that could tow a small home) that happened to tower over my little car right next to theirs. As they got in I saw them out of the corner of my eye noticing that the person in the car next to them (that would be me) was doing a good impersonation of someone trying to scrub their face with steel wool. Curiosity got the best of them and they had to look for a bit! Fortunately they did not walk UP to the car and gawk at me through the window, faces pressed firmly to the glass to get every detail. Instead they just kept their distance, no doubt hoping that something worse wasn’t happneing in the car next to them, like my skin catching fire due to the friction I was creating from the scrub of the “gentle” cloth. They eventually left and so did I. Unscathed, save for a bit of embarrassment though clearly having provided the afternoons entainment.

My little life lesson from this? Just relax and be myself, there’s probably not a whole lot I can do about it anyway!

(Phone booth pic used from BenoitNewton’s Photos, under Creative Commons License)

In Part I of this two part series on the HUBZone program, we covered what the HUBZone program is, how it works and how to tap into it. In Part II we’ll look at the HUBZone in action and the experience of those on the program.

HUBZone in action, experience of those using it now
What are some real life examples that this even IS an advantage to small business and not just a paperchase (or do loop if your a software geek)?

One firm, in Massachusetts, EComp, reported that they had to work extra hard to get their HUBZone designation. They still have to work hard to get government contracts, but, EComp feels that that their HUBZone designation will give them an added value with their large customers. Every large company fulfilling federal government contracts has to meet a HUBZone requirement, if some of them do business with EComp for electronic components they will be able to do just that. So EComp is looking at their HUBZone designation to help them either with government contracts or with larger companies who do business with the government, thus giving them two ways to win the business.

Other companies, such as Keylogic Systems in West Virginia had reported no success with government contracts since they had obtained their HUBZone designation. Keylogic is very successful as a small business, well respected and sought after. But their limited success with HUBZone is related to lack of awareness about HUBZone by contracting officers, a sense that only very simple work can be contracted to HUBZone certified companies, and the ease with which contracting officers can use alternate procurement vehicles.

The secret seems to be in making the marketing of HUBZone, once you have the designation, as much a part of your marketing plan as marketing your product. The HUBZone Contractor’s National Council had these tips to offer (you can down load their presensation at this link here):

• Market to your current customers
  -help them solve their “HUBZone goal challenge”

• Encourage team involvement
  -leverage team partnerships to win tasks

• Educate customers about HUBZone program requirements
  -help them solve “goal problem” by creating solution

• Make all your partners “HUBZone Enabled”
  -provide access to market & contracts previously unavailable
  -market & pursue HUBZone opportunities

• Proactively help your clients meet their HUBZone Goals
  -Previously been a challenge for agencies COs & OSDBU’s
  -Often agencies welcome an familiar & proven solution as they are low risk, easy, comfortable
  -Move new/existing contracts to HUBZone rather than loose to other small business programs

• Steer New Opportunities to HUBZone Program
  -Access opportunities that may otherwise go to other programs
  -Use rule of two – when appropriate
  -Reduce competition
  -Give clients HZ credit

The bottom line seems to be that while HUBZone has been enacted and can help you be more competitive. However, you have to market and use the tool for yourself as you would any other tool to make your small business thrive. The payoff? Tapping into some of that $62.7 billion dollars in prime contracts AND helping depressed areas of your community.

Some resources for further study:

• Senate Committee on Small Business & Entrepreneurship
• USA Small Business Association HUBZone Site
• How to get on the U.S. Government General Services Administration contracts

When my friend said, “hey I’m having a brunch, please come” I thought, ‘what fun! a brunch’. Till she said, “what would you like to bring”. She being Jewish I immediately blurted out, ‘Oh I’ll be bringing kugel” Mind you at the second my mouth opened and my tongue started spewing out the words my brain was screaming “you have NO idea what a kugel is!!” Except I knew it was Jewish and had noodles.

So being the researcher I am, I went to that font of all knowledge, that oracle we now all rely on, the internet. Typing “koogle” in Yahoo search did not confuse the internet into thinking that I really meant “Google”. Instead I got an interesting list of sites that were loosely affiliated with the dish. But none really hit the mark for me until I happened on this non-noodle matzo based version. You can find it by clicking to The Food Network at this link HERE.

The Recipe
Creamy Matzo-Apple Kugel
Courtesy of The Second Avenue Deli Cookbook by Sharon Lebewohl and Rena Bulkin, Villard, 1999

This sweet and creamy kugel makes an impressive centerpiece for a Passover brunch. You can also serve it for dessert.

2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons unsalted butter
4 McIntosh apples, peeled, cored, and cut into 3/4-inch slices, 1/4-inch thick
1/2 cup raisins
1/2 cup sliced blanched almonds
10 squares plain unsalted matzo
4 eggs, beaten
2 cups sour cream
1/2 cup whipped cream cheese
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
Softened butter for greasing pan
Confectioners’ sugar

Melt 2 tablespoons of the butter in a large skillet and saute apple slices on high heat, stirring occasionally, until soft and lightly browned. Remove to a large bowl with a slotted spoon. Add 2 teaspoons butter to the skillet, lower heat to medium, and quickly saute raisins and almonds, stirring constantly. Be careful not to burn them. Add to bowl with apples, and set aside.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place matzo squares in another large bowl, and run cool water over them to soften. Crumble the matzo, and drain in a colander. Return drained matzo to bowl.

Combine eggs with matzo and stir well. In another bowl, mix sour cream and cream cheese thoroughly. Then add it to the matzo mixture, along with sugar, cinnamon, salt, and fruit-nut mixture. Mix all ingredients thoroughly.

Grease a 10-inch square Pyrex baking pan (or similar) with butter (use quite a bit), pour mixture into pan, and bake for 50 minutes or until top is a light golden brown. Let cool on counter. Loosen sides with a knife, place a large platter over the baking pan, and carefully turn the kugel out onto the platter. If any pieces stick in the pan, just put them in place. When cooled, sprinkle top with confectioners’ sugar (best done through a sieve or sifter). YOu can serve this kugel warm (not hot) or at room temperature, but we like it best chilled in the refrigerator with the confectioners’ sugar added just prior to serving.

The Cook’s thoughts
* First of all, this has Almonds in it so a NUT WARNING needs to be heeded.
* Cut all the ingredients up first and put them into bowls. The recipe moves pretty fast once you start and you won’t have time to cut things up. Do it ahead and get it ready.
* Be very careful you don’t burn the apples - On my stove I had to stir very frequently
* Be very careful you don’t burn the almonds and raisins - burn these and the whole dish tastes like burnt almonds and raisins - very icky.
* If you have an extra hot oven that though you set it for 350 it’s really 375, then keep the dish in only 45 minutes.
* Once the matzo is crumbled into the bowl, MASH it somewhat so it’s more crumbly in the bowl prior to actually putting the 4 eggs in.

And what did those who ate it think?
* “Nice consistency, The after taste of cinnamon and apple is wonderful, it lingers making you hungry for more. Might be best with fresh whipped cream on top.”
* “After a night in the fridge it is AMAZINGLY good. very nice texture, mild flavor, appley and nutty. Dusting with confectioner sugar is just the right amount of sweetener.”
* All teenagers who tried it (from 15 - 18) liked it!