Wage slaves for Jesus
Untitled Document If the poor are truly blessed, then God must be smiling on those Chinese workers forced to make crucifixes and other religious articles while toiling in deplorable sweatshop conditions. A highly respected workers’-rights group, the National Labor Committee, has documented the brutal sweatshop conditions at the Junxingye factory in southern China. Here, young…
Untangling the Alzheimer’s mystery
Untitled Document First, let’s clear up a common misconception: Old age doesn’t cause Alzheimer’s disease. Rather, the risk of Alzheimer’s, a progressive and fatal disease that kills cells in the brain, increases with age, particularly in people older than 60 years. Medical experts also estimate that approximately a half-million 30-, 40-, and 50-year olds have Alzheimer’s…
Asbestos flooring
Untitled Document How does one safely remove old vinyl flooring that contains asbestos — and what are some green alternatives? Asbestos is a naturally occurring mineral that can be used in a variety of industrial applications because of its strong flexible fibers, its resistance to heat and chemicals, and the fact that it does not…
Holiday cacti
Untitled Document Though the poinsettia may be the most popular holiday plant, the holiday cactus is a tradition for many families. These easy-to-care-for cacti generally live a long life. In fact, I often hear about holiday cacti that have been passed down from generation to generation as family heirlooms. Holiday cacti include the Thanksgiving cactus,…
Out of sight
Untitled Document Just two months after the City Council passed a new-and-improved trash ordinance, garbage is already back on the table. An ordinance proposed by Ward 5 Ald. Sam Cahnman — who expects it to come before the Jan. 7 meeting of the City Council’s Public Affairs and Safety Committee — states that garbage receptacles…
Sending out another SOS
Untitled Document Each weekend, Earl Wilson and about 40 other homeless people are left without any place to keep warm from around 7 a.m., the time they must leave the Springfield Overflow Shelter, to 9 a.m., when Lincoln Library opens. On an exceptionally chilly Saturday last month, they hoped one of the homeless service agencies…
Exhilarating elixir-ing
Untitled Document The dawn of a new year is an invitation for purging, letting go, detoxifying on all levels. If you’re like me, you’ve probably had your holiday landfill of butter, cream, animal fat, alcohol, and other things that have contributed to dull taste buds and big bulges in all the wrong places. Top this…
Hey, lazy bum: get off the couch!
Untitled Document Let’s backtrack to Jan. 1, 2007. You swore you’d stick to your diet and finally rid yourself of that layer of fat that has come between you and your two-piece for years. Well, guess what: Bikini season has passed. The beach crowds are skimpy, but your waistline is still massive. According to Web…
Health briefs
Untitled Document Don’t assume you have to sweat Older, frail people can get a free “gym pass” and still benefit from activities that are not as taxing as physical fitness, according to a study published in the British Medical Journal. Low-level activities, such as playing cards and shopping, can provide the life-lengthening benefits as exercise,…
Coming to terms
Untitled Document Sixteen-year-old Juno MacGuff (Ellen Page) straddles the line between the fancies of a little girl and the concerns of an adult woman. One moment, she’s talking on a phone shaped liked a hamburger about complex emotions; the next, she’s moving discarded furniture to the home of her best friend, Paulie Bleeker (Michael Cera),…
Healthy & happy
Untitled Document You’ve heard it all before: Mix fun with your fitness, the minutes will just fly by, and before you know it you’ll be 10 pounds lighter. The reality is a bit of a different story. Having fun while you work out is more than simply mounting a TV in front of your treadmill…
Garden lessons for the new year
Untitled Document An experienced plantsman once told me the best time to prune: “Whenever the shears are sharp.” My approach to gardening has followed a similar bent. I do what I can when I can, with what I have. That’s why I was out planting daffodil bulbs on the day before New Year’s Eve. I…
Focused
Untitled Document Clare Lynd-Porter never thought she would be interested in high school artwork. As the founder of Jacksonville’s Imagine Foundation, she was accustomed to curating paintings and photographs from the Midwest’s finest artists. But, through an incident that she calls pure fate, Lynd-Porter met Jake Sorrill — a Routt Catholic sophomore whose only experience…
People’s poetry
Untitled Document ecopoem #5: wind dancers they are dancers awhole ballet corpswhen you come on themabove mendota drivingnorth acres of their sparebeauty grouped here andthere but separated eachher own space her tallslim body chaste whitegown feet lost in snowtheir maestro is the windthey move in perfectsynchronicity each slowlyturning her three-armed bladesin unison with her sistersas…
Letters to the Editor
Untitled Document We welcome letters. Please include your full name, address, and telephone number. We edit all letters. Send them to Letters, Illinois Times, P.O. Box 5256, Springfield, IL 62705; fax 217-753-3958; e-mail editor@illinoistimes.com. CHECK EVERY RETURNING VETERAN I was moved by your article “A father’s plea to stop veterans’ suicides” [Fletcher Farrar, Dec. 20].…
New bands for the new year
Untitled Document In the ever-changing landscape of area bands it seems this first weekend of the New Year delivers us some new groups to ponder and peruse. There’s nothing like switching it up a bit and stirring the pot to bring new flavors to the mix. Any Starry Eye fans left out there? Sure there…
Take a deep breath. Yoga’s easy!
Untitled Document Erinn Tanner’s yoga class begins with pupils on brightly colored foam mats, lying flat on their backs, arms at their sides (think starfish washed ashore) in a position called savasana, or the corpse pose (not corpse in a morbid sense, Tanner says, but rather as a shedding of the old self, a clearing…
