Our World

We’ve talked about the whole issue of using one’s cellphone while driving last year on August 1st, 2009 in our post, “Which States Have Made Using Your Cellphone While Driving Illegal”?   In that post we noted some directories that could tell our readers which states banned what use of cellphones (from talking to texting).   We thought a little update was in order since the whole debate has heated up!

In Massachusetts, starting in October 1, 2010, you may no longer text while you drive.  As if taking your hands and eyes off the road weren’t self-evident enough, the law makes it illegal to text while driving.  Here’s the full scoop as reported in Trucking Info:

Massachusetts has become the 29th state to ban texting while driving, bringing the country one step closer to a nationwide ban on texting behind the wheel.

The new Massachusetts law, signed recently by Gov. Deval Patrick, will fine adults $100 for texting as a first offense, $250 for a second offense, and $500 for a third.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety has done a clear chart on which states ban what regarding cell phone use.  You can see it a their site:  Insurance Institute for Highway Safety Cell Phone Laws

I read Staff Sergeant Jared C. Monti’s story on why he received the U.S. Medal of Honor and I felt compelled to post it.  There’s so many other stories out there about celebrities throwing temper tantrums or snakes on a plane or who knows what that I felt that telling or, in actuality, relaying the story about this courageous soldier was the right thing to do.  And it’s close to home too with Sergeant Monti being a Massachusetts native.

Here is an excerpt from the official U.S. Medal of Honor Citation, our countries highest award for personal bravery:

While Staff Sergeant Monti was leading a mission aimed at gathering intelligence and directing fire against the enemy, his 16-man patrol was attacked by as many as 50 enemy fighters. On the verge of being overrun, Staff Sergeant Monti quickly directed his men to set up a defensive position behind a rock formation. He then called for indirect fire support, accurately targeting the rounds upon the enemy who had closed to within 50 meters of his position. While still directing fire, Staff Sergeant Monti personally engaged the enemy with his rifle and a grenade, successfully disrupting an attempt to flank his patrol. Staff Sergeant Monti then realized that one of his Soldiers was lying wounded in the open ground between the advancing enemy and the patrol’s position.

With complete disregard for his own safety, Staff Sergeant Monti twice attempted to move from behind the cover of the rocks into the face of relentless enemy fire to rescue his fallen comrade. Determined not to leave his Soldier, Staff Sergeant Monti made a third attempt to cross open terrain through intense enemy fire. On this final attempt, he was mortally wounded, sacrificing his own life in an effort to save his fellow Soldier.

Staff Sergeant Monti’s selfless acts of heroism inspired his patrol to fight off the larger enemy force. Staff Sergeant Monti’s immeasurable courage and uncommon valor are in keeping with the highest traditions of military service and reflect great credit upon himself, Headquarters and Headquarters Troop, 3rd Squadron, 71st Cavalry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, and the United States Army.

You can read the Presidential address and more at Sergeant Monti’s Medal of Honor Page set up in honor of him by the U.S. Government.   Thank you Sergeant Monti for everything you did for us in the United States.

As we blogged about yesterday, Slideshare is a great Frugal Tech approved tool to help you share presentations, webinars and other material with others.  Well, as we down our first cup of coffee here at Beck’s Cafe it appears someone else thinks Slideshare is pretty good too: The U.S. Whitehouse!  Some of the materal they present includes sort of more mundane official greetings or pronouncements, but some other material is more weighty like Innovation in America, some presedential speaches, official U.S. reports on the environment and more.   You can reach the White House Channel on Slideshare at this link:  http://www.slideshare.net/whitehouse

The good folks at TG Life, pointed out to our caffeine jolted staff here at Beck’s Cafe that an excellent follow up article had been written on Mike Penner/Christine Daniels suicide.   It’s a very good article and some of the comments are helpful as well.   The story does a very good job of outlining the pressure Christine was under, how, perhaps, the Times didn’t think through how to best work with her, and some of the elation and then isolation she felt prior to her sad death.

There are some lessons I think.  Wendy, one of our readers, noted in a comment she left during our first article on Christine Daniels that:

The pressures from society, our families, the media, etc. can exert such a profound force on a transgendered person. I think if we can provide more friendship and love to others experiencing this major adjustment maybe we could prevent the suicides.

Wendy makes an important point that relationships are important and we couldn’t agree more.  Christine apparently had them but closed herself off to them.  What do we do then?  So many of us feel we can’t intrude in others lives but, maybe, there are red flags that should say, “propriety be damned” and we barge in anyway?

You can read the follow up article at The Daily Beast, “The Sad Struggles of a Transsexual Sportswriter“.

This might be the saddest headline I’ve read in a long time.  Christine Daniels has died.  In 2007 she, then known as Mike Penner, declared, under gender therapist care, that he was in fact a transexual woman, and began her RLE as Christine Daniels.  Later, she actually left her RLE and returned back to the LA Times as Mike Penner and continued her writing career with the LA Times as Mike.

I don’t want to believe Mike/Christine is dead.  And, I especially don’t want to believe it’s from her taking her own life.  That cuts too close to home for our community.  Mona Rae Mason, of the National Institute of Health funded Transgender Project, has noted about transgender women from the study:

The rate of lifetime major depression in this study of male to female transgender persons was 54.3%. That is almost three times higher than the corresponding estimate for the general population.

Suicide ideation for this same group was at 53.3%, again three times higher than the general population.

Actual suicide plans and attempts, 35.0% in the younger group, and 27.9% in the older, are seven and 10 times higher than the NCS estimates. SEVEN to TEN times!

You can read more about Christine Daniel’s death at:

1. The LA Times
2. The Huffington Post
3. National Public Radio

Happy New Year to our wonderful Jewish Readers!

L’Shanah Tovah Tikatevu!

And now a little fun for Rosh Hashanah: “A Rosh HaShanah Blessing” Courtesy of Koach

All of our readers are, no doubt, familiar with the Rosh HaShanah custom of eating an apple dipped in honey and other symbolic foods that express our wishes for the New Year. Here are some new ideas:

We should eat things that imply happiness, sweetness and prosperity – like Cheerios, honeydew, plums and Cream of Wheat (see Psalm 81:17).

To promote tolerance among Jews, we should drink orange juice, grape juice and apple juice.

To stress unity, we ought to eat things that stick together, like macaroni and cheese, and peanut butter.

To remind us of the need for love and good will, let’s have Hershey’s kisses and Life Savers.

We should avoid eating anything that sounds violent: no cereal that has the words “Smacks” or “Pops” in their titles, no artichokes, no squash and no Bazooka gum. Also, nothing that sounds meshuggah, like flakes, bananas, or fruit cake. And definitely no bologna!

Lastly, we should eat as many peas as possible, with the hope that this will finally be the year that we see peace in our war-weary world!

On this 8th anniversary of 9-11, Beck’s Cafe would like to honor the victims and those who lost so many during that tragic day.  We also want to thank the so many hero’s in the average citizens, the police, fire and rescue workers, our CIA, FBI and other national security teams and our armed forces who prevented the attack on our country from being worse than it was and for keeping us safe since then.  Thank you.

I’m sure everyone has their own memories of where you were or what you were doing.  If you don’t have a place to share them, feel free to share them here at Beck’s Cafe in comments to our post.

In 2006 we posted about 9-11 in stories and pictures and we talked about the September 11 Digital Archive.  That archive is still funded and still up on the web.  It’s a wonderful resource about that historic day and well worth your visit.

In what can only be thought of as a brief display of hilarity, the Wall Street Journal tells us, in their September 1st,”Real Time Economics” newsletter that, when Men’s brief’s sales start to rise that the economy will as well.   As silly as this sounds, the logic goes like this, according to the WSJ,

Sales of men’s underwear typically are stable because they rank as a necessity. But during times of severe financial strain, men will try to stretch the time between buying new pairs, causing underwear sales to dip.

And, when men’s underwear sags, well, the economy, inevitably, takes a dip too.  As The Journal reports it:

“It’s a prolonged purchase,” said Marshal Cohen, senior analyst with the consumer research firm NPD Group. “It’s liketrying to drive your car an extra 10,000 miles.”

According to retailers, the men’s brief’s sales started to dip when the recession took hold last year and sales of Men’s underwear is expected to dip 2.3% this year and only .5% next year.   The true creator of this MUI (mens underwear index) is actually Allen Greenspan, as reported in the Huffington Post.  What might his underwear drawer tell us now?

Curiously, women’s underwear sales do not seem to be an economic indicator, remaining stable in both sweet and sour economies.  One would presume that since women tend to do most of a family’s domestic shopping that they re-route some of the budget to their own needs – including that of underwear?