Housekeeping for one is a lot easier than housekeeping for two. And women STILL do most to all of the housework in whatever kind of household they live in. That is the most simple and obvious explanation.

In central Oregon, wind farms are dotting the landscape and helping local farmers stay on their land. The leases for turbine pads provide income for farmers in this area of extremely low rainfall, and the rural counties in windy areas have gotten an improved tax base out of the deal.

The windmills themselves are not unsightly at all. Against a big sky, they aren't really visible until one is quite close. The sleek windmill designs and slow-moving blades don't rest heavily on the landscape. The first impression is that they are part of an art installation. You can't say that about a coal-burning plant. And they are silent, unless you stand directly beneath one, and then all you hear is a slight "whoosh" as the blade sweeps by.

The blades would have to wipe out whole species of birds to come close to the impact of pollution from fossil-fuel derived energy.

With sensitive siting, wind power has most of the pluses, and none of the minuses, of petroleum-based energy production.

mlw

Treating butt-smacking by adolescents the same as rape will make lists of "registered sex offenders" meaningless. I don't care if a butt-smacking teenager lives next door; I do care if a child molester does. Does someone convicted of indecent exposure for taking a piss in an alley pose the same risk as someone flashing schoolkids? No, and shame on us if we can't tell the difference.

We no longer know any middle ground in this country, no longer care to think about complex issues or differentiate between real damaging behavior and simple rudeness. "Zero tolerance," means kids with asthma inhalers are treated like crack dealers, pot-smokers are jailed longer than murderers and clumsy adolescent exploration of sexuality results in the label "sex offender."

Our brains have turned to mush.

We paid off, then finally got rid of, our credit cards. It took awhile, but we now receive almost no (relatively) credit card solicitations.

The credit card companies don't exist to provide credit to those of us who pay off credit cards or manage them wisely; that kind of customer just isn't attractive in today's corporate climate that demands obscene profits.

And those of us who live without credit cards are the least attractive customers, so they (almost) don't bother trying to sign us up.

MLW

Bras are unnatural. Period. Breasts are meant to move, to swing as you walk, to bounce as you run. Scrunching them into a bra impedes circulation and it has been suggested that bras, especially tight ones, may be a cause of breast cancer (lymph not draining properly, and all that).

And bras are singularly unattractive unless brand new and worn by nubile young things; aged bras on less perfect forms are disgusting.

Free your breasts and let them bounce, sway and jiggle as Nature meant them to do, no matter what their size. You'll get used to it and your breasts will be all the healthier for it.

MLW

As it happens, Snarling Coyote, I'm rather well endowed and haven't worn a bra since I was about 19 (over 30 years ago), and my booby sag is age- and gravity-appropriate and less than that of life-long chest harnessers.

If you want saggy breasts, then by all means wear a bra - wear it 24/7. Whatever connective tissue holds them up will atrophy with disuse. And those National Geographic images of droopy breasts? those are the result of low/no body fat, not the absence of brassieres.

I believe it is males (ordinary and the bra-manufacturing kind) who have convinced us that our breasts need support. Remember corsets? girdles? pointy-toed shoes? All part of the same binding of women's assets and the demand that we shape ourselves to conform to some assinine feminine ideal.

I stand, and my tits stand, by my assertion that bras are unnatural, unnecessary and potentially harmful. Here's a link to an article about this: http://www.all-natural.com/bras.html

While there doesn't appear to be any current research on this matter - at least not online - the potential for harm from constant compression of breast tissue is worth considering.

MLW