As a recent subscriber to The Anchorage [Alaska] Daily News, I have been reading about the yearly Iditarod.  Now in its 38th year, this newspaper reports on the following brief blurbs.  I hope you enjoy reading this.  It is simple, to the point, and honest to goodness fun with a pot o’ gold!  Enjoy!  AR.

The Anchorage Daily News, 1001 Northway Drive, Anchorage, AK, 99508, USA ——————————————

Iditarod 38 ——————————————

March 11, 2010               

Iditarod: Day 5 (McGrath and Takotna)

Hugh Neff gets a kiss form Geronimo at the Takotna, Alaska, checkpoint on Wednesday March 10, 2010 during the 2010 Iditarod Sled Dog Race. Geronimo was born of Annie, Neff’s main leader. A number of Annies offspring are on his team, which he calls “Annie’s Army.”

— http://www.adn.com/2010/03/10/1177672/iditarod-day-5-mcgrath-and-takotna.html —

 The Sled Blog

The news, notes, and video of the Iditarod from rural Alaska blogger Kyle Hopkins.

Twitter: Iditarod Live

Follow our tweets from the trail for constant coverage throughout the race.

Pack of Iditarod icons bears down on leaders

Dallas Seavey won the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race halfway prize for reaching the Cripple checkpoint first early this morning, but a small cavalry of some of the best mushers in the world were on their sleds out of Ophir well before dawn, bearing down on the leaders.

Battered but not beaten, mushers, dogs rest

Resting dog teams practically outnumbered local residents Wednesday in Takotna where retired pathologist and 69-year-old  musher Jim Lanier sat in the tribal hall after finishing a burger.

Iditarod mystery: How long is the Iditarod?

Many Iditarod junkies wonder exactly how far is it to Nome. The Iditarod Trail Committee claims 1,149 miles on both its northern  and southern routes — an effort to ensure the distance includes 49 (for  the 49th state) and exceeds the 1,000-mile Yukon Quest International  Sled Dog Race between Whitehorse and Fairbanks.

Baker delays 24-hour rest, eyes halfway prize

While most Iditarod front-runners were in the middle of their 24-hour layovers in Takotna, Ophir or McGrath, John Baker of Kotzebue struck out alone for Cripple, the abandoned mining town where he should be able to claim the $3,000 halfway prize.

Gatt, Smyth first to Ophir

As many top mushers in the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race caught up on sleep, food and relaxation in the comfortable village of Takotna, Hans Gatt of Whitehorse and Cim Smyth of Big Lake pushed ahead to Ophir in the early morning hours.

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All contents copyright 2010 Anchorage, Daily News

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This article will briefly concentrate on a “TOCYD” event.   TCOYD is the acronym for “Taking Care of Your Diabetes.”  I was one of 1,5oo participants to be able to part take in this event that was held for the first time in Sacramento County, California, on Saturday, February 27, 2010.

This is a non-profit organization that was inspired by Ken Facter, MD, MBA, JD.  Not until 1995 did Dr. Facter’s associate/colleague, Dr. Steven Edelman, envision a “patient-oriented educational conference” to totally involve and encompass the lives of all diabetics and their non-diabetic significant others.  Having met Dr. Edelman, the man exudes hope, confidence and a positive will toward appreciation and understanding of this disease.

Why was this ‘conference’ never brought to the Sacramento, CA, area before now?  I do not know.   As much as any other area around our globe, diabetics and their non-diabetic counterparts are massive in numbers.

I first learned about this event/organization through a mailed flyer back in early January, 2010.  The JDRF (Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation) notified me.  How do they know of my existence?  That’s easy to answer.  Having been diabetic for fifty years, the JDRF is inescapable in most aspects related to diabetes to include locating people.  After reading and re-reading this two-page brochure, I decided it would be worth my while in time and money for a Saturday.  Enough time was alloted to plan my busy schedule to parttake in this event.  I also borrowed some loose change from my ‘piggy bank’ (a glass jar) just-in-case.

Over all, I am glad I participated.  It is always nice, comforting, to meet and hear people discuss the cumbersome and intricate facts involved with living this disease.  Diabetes remains unappreciated and misunderstood. 

If interested, please research “Taking Care of Your Diabetes.”   Events are held across the United States to include Hawaii.  Perhaps in your travels, you may want to learn more about attending such a learned and upbeat affair.   

Take care!  AR.

Thomas More

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Saint Thomas More
Portrait by Hans Holbein the Younger (1527).
Martyr
Born	7 February 1478, London, England
Died	6 July 1535 (aged 57), London, England
Venerated in	Roman Catholic Church, Anglican Communion
Beatified	1886, Rome by Pope Leo XIII
Canonized	19 May 1935, Rome by Pope Pius XI
Feast	22 June (Roman Catholic Church) 6 July (on some local calendars and in the Anglican Communion)
Attributes	dressed in the robe of the Chancellor and wearing the Collar of Esses; axe
Patronage	Adopted children; Ateneo de Manila Law School; civil servants; Diocese of Arlington; Diocese of Pensacola-Tallahassee; University of Malta; University of Santo Tomas Faculty of Arts and Letters; court clerks; lawyers, politicians, and statesmen; stepparents; widowers; difficult marriages; large families

Sir Thomas More (7 February 1478 – 6 July 1535), also known as Saint Thomas More, was an English lawyer, scholar, author and statesman. He is also recognised as being a saint within the Catholic Church. During his life he gained a reputation as a leading Renaissance humanist, an opponent of the Protestant Reformation of Martin Luther and wrote long treatises opposing William Tyndale and others who wished to see the Bible translated into the English language.  For three years toward the end of his life he was Lord Chancellor.

More coined the word “utopia” – a name he gave to the ideal, imaginary island nation whose political system he described in Utopia, published in 1516. An important counsellor to Henry VIII of England, he was imprisoned and executed by beheading in 1535 after he had fallen out of favour with the king over his refusal to sign the Act of Supremacy 1534, which declared the king to be the Supreme Head of the Church of England, effecting a final split with the Catholic Church in Rome. More was beatified by the Catholic Church in 1886 and canonised, with John Fisher, in 1935. In 1980, he was added to the Church of England calendar of saints.

It’s that time of year again.  Wetness from day-after-day of rain, colder temperatures, an ugly and constant muddiness, a consistent and persistent cloudy sky.  In sixteen days of this past mont, I saw the sun twice.   Because I work at home, my two dogs have become my salvation to get outside.  Otherwise, I would not go out at all.  Well, besides them and having to go to the grocery store.

Yep, I have a case of log-cabin fever with a touch of the doldrums.

Are you feeling that way?

Not to be inappreciable with nature, I know some geographic areas are lots worse than mine – weather-wise.  For instance, I have lived many many years on the East Coast of the continental U. S. A. and do not miss that weather!  Although I do miss watching snow-falls and ice skating, I do not miss the cold temperatures (the lowest I have personally experienced was negative 23 degrees below Fahrenheit!).  Nor do I miss that areas’ summer humidity.  Having lived a few months in the south-eastern U. S., the humidity was so heavy that I contracted a fungal discoloration and disorder in my skin!  I was medically told to treat that condition with Head & Shoulders shampoo, of all things.  Are you familiar with that?  I had to “smurf up” every day until it disappeared.  

I need a physical ‘re-birthing’ with some sunshine.  Spring allows me that grace.  Summer is another story in this area of northern California where I reside.  Having witnessed day-upon-day of temperatures above 105 degrees fahrenheit (the highest I lived through was 118 degrees), I think and remember the winter cold.  Autumn is a welcome reprieve and my favorite time of year.

On and on we go. 

How are you and your area’s weather?

Oprah, Oprah, Oprah – yes, the one and only “Oprah [Winfrey]” with whom many of us are familiar.

I am referring to her television show that aired Thursday, February 4, 2010, regarding “diabetes.”  Having read enough blogs from naysayers, I would like to rid of the negativity or at least try. 

As I am not a consecutive viewer of her show, I was able to catch the last ten minutes of this particular one.  Thanks to bloggers’ notifications about its date and time, I never would have known. 

To go on, I simply want to thank Ms. Winfrey and her compatriots for attempting the subject of diabetes.  I am unfamiliar with other television show hosts having ever attempted this subject.  As a life-time diabetic, this disease and all of its subject matters are complex, baffling, intricate in daily details, tiring, and unending.  How could one show-host cover it all?  “Impossible,” I say. 

Aside from “dTV (diabetic television),” a supposed television show pertaining strictly to diabetes, I have never known diabetes to be internationally broadcast.  “dTV” is unavailable to me, therefore, I cannot comment on its progression.  I knew of its existence through a magazine advertisement seen many years ago.  Why not comment on that show?  I, for one, would like to hear about it.  Perhaps it no longer exists.

To conclude, Ms. Winfrey brought international notification and realization to the pandemic of diabetes – if only by simply giving it time.  Time is what is needed.  Unless a person lives with it, it is difficult to understand.  It may be appreciate; a diabetic’s efforts to thrive may be appreciated; but to understand is different.  It is a worldwide concern in competition with so many other human diseases.  Hindsight, as always, will materialize.  Simply, thank you, Ms. Winfrey.

AK.