Bloggedy Blog :)

Belly Jam April 18

Raven — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 17:35:53 GMT

This is going to be an awesome group of dancers and friends getting together to share their beautiful dance with our community! So come on down and have some fun!

Bush: 8 Years in 8 Minutes

Raven — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 15:44:29 GMT

Thank GOD this guy is out of office. Hearing all of those things at once is enough to make you want to pull your hair out. What an ASS! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJ71w_kdvAU

Another Hooper on Ellen

Raven — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 20:06:25 GMT

just saw another fabulous hooper on Ellen - she really helps promote the hooping! YAY -will find a link when it get's posted by somebody :)

A cool site to make ya smile :)

Raven — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 21:11:56 GMT

I have a fascination with Alice In Wonderland and even used the story as the theme for my costumed 30th! :) This site has that feel to it :) ENJOY;) http://www.adobecards.com/

Save Small Business From The Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act

Raven — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 16:10:19 GMT

I make hoops - and kids should be able to use them. Small Business Toy-Makers will be crushed under the weight and restrictions of this new Act if it is not adjusted. I want children to be safe from the things which come out of other countries and our own but this Act has gone overboard! This is a repost from http://www.hooping.org/archives/002074.html#more Fighting The Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act Erika Fey (pictured) sells hoops at a few stores in Portland, Oregon. Recently she got the news from one of the store owners that they'd no longer be carrying her hoops. Why? The Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA). The CPSIA regarding toy safety and testing which takes effect in the United States starting on February 9th, 2009, is already creating problems that could be more devastating for hoop makers that sell their hoops as toys and other cottage industry than we can even imagine. The fines for any item subject to testing that has not been tested or did not pass found in circulation could also be devastating to retailers and manufactures alike. What is the CPSIA and how did this come about? Let us explain. In 2007, large toy manufacturers who outsource their production to China and other developing countries violated the public's trust. They were selling toys containing dangerously high lead content, unsafe small parts, and chemicals that made kids sick. In response the United States Congress rightly recognized that the Consumer Products Safety Commission (CPSC) lacked the authority and staffing to prevent dangerous toys from being imported into the United States. As a result they passed the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) in August 2008. Among other things, the CPSIA bans lead and phthalates in children's products, mandates third party testing and certification, and requires manufacturers of all goods for children under the age of 12, to permanently label each item with a date and batch number. While all of these changes are fairly easy for large, multinational companies to comply with who make thousands of units of each item with very little incremental cost to pay for testing and updating their systems to include batch labels, many small businesses will be forced to shut their doors due to the costs of mandatory testing. How much money are we talking? As much as $4,000 or more per item. And the few larger manufacturers who still employ workers in the United States face increased costs to comply with the CPSIA, even though American-made toys had nothing to do with the toy safety problems of 2007. Anyone who produces or sells not only hoops as toys, but books, clothing, art, educational supplies, materials for the learning disabled, bicycles, and more will be subject to the new law. Any uncertified item intended for children under the age of 12 will be considered contraband after February 10, 2009, and it will be illegal to sell or give these items away to charities and the government will require their destruction or permanent disposal, resulting in millions of tons of unnecessary waste, and placing an enormous strain on our landfills. For more information on the work that's being done to amend the CPSIA so that all businesses large and small are able to comply and survive, please visit The Handmade Toy Alliance. As Fey told Hooping.org, "Hopefully something good can be done because as we will all agree, there should be many many more hoops in this world, and this law should not get in the way of that!" This really will affect all of us - please take a moment to read up on the act and take action. Here are several resources and recommended ways to voice your opinion! Also please write to your Congress Person and Senator to request changes to save handmade children’s products - a sample letter is here: http://www.handmadetoyalliance.org/how-you-can-help find your Congress Person here: https://writerep.house.gov/writerep/welcome.shtml and Senator here: http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm CPSIA Government site: http://www.cpsc.gov/ABOUT/Cpsia/cpsia.HTML - The act is open for public comment on the latest exemptions to the Act until January 30. Comments must be received by the Office of the Secretary no later than January 30, 2009. Comments may be filed by email to Sec102ComponentPartsTesting@cpsc.gov. Comments may also be filed by facsimile to (301) 504-0127 or by mail or delivery to the Office of the Secretary, Consumer Product Safety Commission, Room 502, 4330 East-West Highway, Bethesda, Maryland, 20814. Comments should be captioned “Section 102 Mandatory Third-Party Testing of Component Parts.” Interested persons will also have additional opportunities to comment following publication of any notices of rulemaking proceedings in the Federal Register which are commenced under this section.

WOWZA!

Raven — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 16:29:03 GMT

This is so completely crazy! I've always wanted to fly - this seems pretty darned close. Of course, the whole "fear of heights" thing might get in the way - HAHA http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=1778399&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1

A Pair of Unusual Friends

Raven — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 21:42:11 GMT

Let's try once more with FEEEELING ;) Thanks Caroleeena for helping the periodically technologically challenged ;P http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBtFTF2ii7U It will make you smile - promise!

I diiid iiiit :)

Raven — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:42:37 GMT

Actually I was listening to I Did It by The Dave Matthews Band when ~ I REALLY DID IT - that is to say - I changed hoops to one of the 100psi hoops I made and was able to chest hoop without a problem - arms in arms out whatever - BOOYAKACHA!!!!!!!!! Is this a New Years Miracle? Who knows - but I'm embracing it:) Love to all and wishes for a prosperous, happy and growth-filled new year!

That Feeling

Raven — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 16:48:28 GMT

I am not sure what it is about the holidays , that mad combination of happiness and the blues - all rolled together. Strange - yet, somehow normal. I feel a bit blue today - so I am going to go within my hoop - it always makes me feel better. I don't know what it is - or what to call it - but when I am in my hoop and my eyes are closed or I am blindfolded - I feel what can only be describe as some kind of energy moving through me. It feels something like a chill, but - not. I can't explain it. All I know is that I have always felt it during my life but only when I am hearing things that ring true to my soul or experiencing things which I know I was meant to experience. During the HoopPath workshop this weekend - I felt it again - INTENSELY - while we were all hooping blindfolded. As Baxter moved through our group and saying things like BELIEVE, BELIEVE, BELIEVE - FEEL FEEL FEEL - I felt like I had an explosion of this feeling welling up in me. Let's see if I can re-capture it again:)

Indian Attacks

Raven — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 21:03:54 GMT

Oh no - this is just craziness! I'm just praying that people get out of the hostage situations alive. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081126/ap_on_re_as/as_india_shooting

Rally of Hope

Raven — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 19:11:12 GMT

I went to the Anti-Proposition 8 Rally at City Hall in Philadelphia yesterday. It was a truly amazing experience and one I will NEVER forget! I am so filled with hope after seeing so many people come together in a display of solidarity and that WE as a people WILL NOT stand by and let oppression happen any longer. "What do we want? EQUALITY When do we want it? NOW!" My voice stood with 5,000 other people as we marched around City Hall - stopping traffic - in a peaceful display of One-ness. Beautiful http://picasaweb.google.com/zyggyrat/Prop8Protest111508#

Bone Transplant May Be The Cure To AIDS!

Raven — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 17:44:21 GMT

http://health.yahoo.com/news/ap/eu_med_aids_treatment.html BERLIN - An American man who suffered from AIDS appears to have been cured of the disease 20 months after receiving a targeted bone marrow transplant normally used to fight leukemia, his doctors said. While researchers — and the doctors themselves — caution that the case might be no more than a fluke, others say it may inspire a greater interest in gene therapy to fight the disease that claims 2 million lives each year. The virus has infected 33 million people worldwide. Dr. Gero Huetter said Wedneday his 42-year-old patient, an American living in Berlin who was not identified, had been infected with the AIDS virus for more than a decade. But 20 months after undergoing a transplant of genetically selected bone marrow, he no longer shows signs of carrying the virus. "We waited every day for a bad reading," Huetter said. It has not come. Researchers at Berlin's Charite hospital and medical school say tests on his bone marrow, blood and other organ tissues have all been clean. However, Dr. Andrew Badley, director of the HIV and immunology research lab at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., said those tests have probably not been extensive enough. "A lot more scrutiny from a lot of different biological samples would be required to say it's not present," Badley said. This isn't the first time marrow transplants have been attempted for treating AIDS or HIV infection. In 1999, an article in the journal Medical Hypotheses reviewed the results of 32 attempts reported between 1982 and 1996. In two cases, HIV was apparently eradicated, the review reported. Huetter's patient was under treatment at Charite for both AIDS and leukemia, which developed unrelated to HIV. As Huetter — who is a hematologist, not an HIV specialist — prepared to treat the patient's leukemia with a bone marrow transplant, he recalled that some people carry a genetic mutation that seems to make them resistant to HIV infection. If the mutation, called Delta 32, is inherited from both parents, it prevents HIV from attaching itself to cells by blocking CCR5, a receptor that acts as a kind of gateway. "I read it in 1996, coincidentally," Huetter told reporters at the medical school. "I remembered it and thought it might work." Roughly one in 1,000 Europeans and Americans have inherited the mutation from both parents, and Huetter set out to find one such person among donors that matched the patient's marrow type. Out of a pool of 80 suitable donors, the 61st person tested carried the proper mutation. Before the transplant, the patient endured powerful drugs and radiation to kill off his own infected bone marrow cells and disable his immune system — a treatment fatal to between 20 and 30 percent of recipients. He was also taken off the potent drugs used to treat his AIDS. Huetter's team feared that the drugs might interfere with the new marrow cells' survival. They risked lowering his defenses in the hopes that the new, mutated cells would reject the virus on their own. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infections Diseases in the U.S., said the procedure was too costly and too dangerous to employ as a firstline cure. But he said it could inspire researchers to pursue gene therapy as a means to block or suppress HIV. "It helps prove the concept that if somehow you can block the expression of CCR5, maybe by gene therapy, you might be able to inhibit the ability of the virus to replicate," Fauci said. David Roth, a professor of epidemiology and international public health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said gene therapy as cheap and effective as current drug treatments is in very early stages of development. "That's a long way down the line because there may be other negative things that go with that mutation that we don't know about." Even for the patient in Berlin, the lack of a clear understanding of exactly why his AIDS has disappeared means his future is far from certain. "The virus is wily," Huetter said. "There could always be a resurgence."