"An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind." - Mahatma Ghandi

To make a donation to disaster relief funds, please visit PayPal Relief Donations or the Amazon.com Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund. Amazon.com has collected over $2,000,000.00 and PayPal has collected over $450,000.00. Your entire donation will go directly to the Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund and will help the victims of Tuesday's attacks. Any little bit helps, whether it's a single dollar or a hundred dollars.

The American Red Cross web site contains information about blood donation and other relief efforts.

Humans sleep more soundly in space than they do on Earth, according to the recently published findings of a 1998 study. Whether or not this will encourage more earthlings to become space tourists has yet to be seen, but it does give me new ideas of where to send my family members when they keep me awake with their snoring.

"People are still a little bit skeptical, but that should change once I have the guillotine built." How many times have we heard that? This time, the hopeful individual making the statement is thirty-three year old Mississippi resident Paul Morgan, who has planned to amputate his own feet during an Internet broadcast. Paul hopes to raise enough money from the broadcast to be able to afford (titanium) prosthetic legs which would allow him to walk normally and resume the water sports he loves. Paul's web site is the aptly named www.cutoffmyfeet.com.

My cats referred me to this story, about the use of catnip as an insect repellant. "Nepetalactone, which gives catnip its odor, was found to be 10 times more effective than the popular insect repellent diethyl-meta-toluamide (DEET)." Good news for cats everywhere, who have long touted the medicinal benefits of this popular feline street drug.

In encouraging news for young people with chronic fatigue syndrome, the Chicago Tribune reports, "Most kids with chronic fatigue syndrome get better."

Chronic fatigue syndrome is an illness characterized by incapacitating fatigue, neurocognitive difficulties, muscle pain, multi-joint pain, and numerous other symptoms. [case definition]

This is only one of many examples of why people should not be allowed to have large snakes like Burmese Pythons as pets. My (least) favorite part of the story is the fact that the ten foot long python was taken to a pet store after the family who owned it proved themselves incapable of caring for it. These amazing snakes belong in jungles and responsible zoos. They are not pets. In general, snakes are not pets! It's very difficult to provide an appropriate life for a snake in a house. There are people who manage to do so, but they are few and far between. It makes me sick to see baby pythons for sale in neighborhood pet stores. Accidents like these are not the fault of the animal. They're the fault of people who lack sense. That's all I have to say about that.

"I'm not that interested in space." - John F. Kennedy, as quoted by Wired.com in an interesting article about the race to the moon. Although President Kennedy's interest (or lack thereof) in the space program may not have much relevance to the lives of today's Americans, the article includes what may still be timely sentiments about NASA's expenses: "Kennedy talked about how $125 million was being spent on an instrument he couldn't even name. Webb and the other NASA officials told him it was a linear accelerator. 'Everyone says we're No. 1 (with that),' Kennedy said. 'That's wonderful but no one knows anything about it.'"