Canaries, that is. And us delicately constituted Californians.

Seriously, I found this article somewhat alarming.

In just two or three minutes of preheating, your (Teflon) pan will give off fumes that can make you sick. Each time you use medium to high heat on an empty pan, the surface on Teflon-coated and other nonstick cookware breaks apart and emits a toxic chemical called perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA, according to the Environmental Working Group, a Washington, D.C., organization that investigates issues of environmental health and safety.

Avian veterinarians have known for decades that Teflon off-gases are a leading cause of death among birds, and estimated that hundreds, perhaps thousands, of birds are killed each year.

Like the canaries that were used in the coal mines, birds act as an early warning system for humans. The EPA recommends that bird owners avoid cookware and heated appliances with nonstick coatings completely. Perhaps everyone should be heeding this warning.

In January 2006, DuPont agreed to an EPA plan to phase out PFOA by the year 2015.

I'm not going to throw out my teflon quite yet, but I am going to take the following precautions (at least until the next environmental hazard comes along).

If a recipe calls for preheating an empty pan, either put the oil in first anyway, use a stainless steel or cast iron pan, or get someone else to cook it for you and stay far away from the kitchen. (Ha! Just kidding about that last one.) Also good advice from the article - never preheat teflon on high, and make sure your kitchen is well ventilated. Also, keep pet birds out of the kitchen.

Great, one more thing to worry about.

Wow. I need a tan.

Who could say no to a free sample of unagi?









It'll take me forever to try everything here.

I would love to comment/post in response to the happiness theme. But I'm way too emotionally drained for that right now.

My replacement battery charger arrived today! I should have bought the damn thing 8 months ago when I realized my digital camera battery charger somehow ended up in storage with most of my other stuff. I never thought I'd be a nomad this long, though.

Here's a "candid" shot of my estrip bumper sticker. The only thing that would make it more beautiful here would be two tickets to the Buzzcocks pinned under it! (e:Leetee) - I can't believe you saw them twice!!! My music buddy Larry has our tickets for July 27th at Mezzanine. I can't wait!



p.s. - now that I have my battery charger, I'll have to take my estrip bumper sticker out for another photo shoot. You might think that's extreme, but extreme would be washing my car first. Yeah, I'm not up to that.

p.p.s. - some day I'll keep the bumper sticker on my car. But right now, I'm afraid with my luck - and in my neighborhood - it would get stolen/vandalized. If I ever get to that happiness post, I'll try to explain my relationship with irony. Although I'm already pretty sure you're not going to want to read it.

(The rest of the sailboat story...)

The transport service only let my brother know two days in advance of when they planned to haul the boat. So my brother had to high-tail it down to NC to get it prep'd and give the underside as good of a cleaning as possible. My brother-in-law (who lives in Monroe NC) met him there to help. They did a 45 minute dive to clean the hull and keel the eve before hauling.

My brother's drive home after that was the most harrowing part. Here's the story (in his own words).


They will put her on stands and unstep the mast and get it ready for transporting to Connecticut. They'll come back a week from tomorrow and move it to Connecticut.

My drive from Washington to Newark NJ was definitely an exhilarating one. I have never been in so many electrical storms with so much intensity. It seemed like I caught a western moving front that ran from MD to CT. The lightning was blinding at times. I was at the apex of the Delaware Memorial Bridge and wind and rain was blowing upward over the bridge and an enormous flash and instant crack of thunder seemed like it was directly above me.

I was holding off on getting gas until NJ since they pump it for you (state law), it's considerably cheaper and it had been raining sideways since I was south of Baltimore. I pulled into the first service area off the NJ turnpike, but they had no power. The car computer read 40 miles until an empty tank and the next service area was 36 miles. One traffic jam and I would've been on the side of the road in monsoon rains so I took the first exit off the turnpike and headed for a town 2 miles west, but only to find the same result. No power. Off to the next town, lights out, trees and limbs down. Asked a cop who who was warning people of deep water on the road where to go and he sent me south on I 295 for 5 miles. Finally found a station that had power restored but the pumps would not reset. The guy said to give him 5 minutes. I did and he got them working though had to pay cash as the credit card machine was not working (keep that in mind Dad the next time you drive home from CT with $5 cash in your wallet).

I was finally headed back in the right direction with a full tank of gas. I arrived home at 12:30 this morning -- 10 hours after leaving NC.

Now to the good part -- see pictures below. It was really interesting to see how they have to haul boats at this lake. The trailer they pulled mine out on can handle up to 50' sailboats. They hauled it and put it on stands, then removed (unstepped) the mast with a boom crane. They then hauled a 35' power boat and took it to Myrtle Beach. They'll come back Wednesday and load mine to transport to CT.

Anyway, all went extremely well -- in fact, it could not have gone better. Looking forward to taking everyone out for a sail.









p.s. - wow, I can't believe I never posted any pix from the family sailing trip last year. Guess that was back when I was still trying to make a go of it at alamedalink.com. God, I was so naive back then!