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Romney's 'Housing Plan' Already Making an Impact in La Jolla {AOL Real Estate}
Jun 7th 2012 3:24PM How very California. A McMansion snuggled up against the smaller, older homes. If you got it, flaunt it.
Romney's 'Housing Plan' Already Making an Impact in La Jolla {AOL Real Estate}
Jun 7th 2012 3:22PM How very California. A McMansion snuggled up against small family homes. If you got it, flaunt it.
Trouble Blooms: Condo Board Sues Resident Over Flowers {AOL Real Estate}
Mar 20th 2012 3:25PM In New York City, Forest Hills is a planned community with hired gardeners who maintain it according to the plans laid out by the original developer, Olmstead, a landscape gardener. New owners have to agree to respect the plans, although at least one very elderly woman has planted plastic flowers and banners in her yard, which amuses some neighbors and offends other. The gardeners either weed around or remove and replace the decorations, they like the old lady. It seems to me that she has, at least, common law on her side, her garden is "grandfathered" in, it existed before the new management rules were adopted, and unless it was specifically outlawed at that time, they cannot go back and change it now unless there is an overwhelming public necessity. Of course condo boards are usually power crazy individuals with very little sense, who thing that maintaining a totally sterile environment is the way to "preserve property values." One condo attempted to forbid family picnics on the lawn after a black family moved in and invited relatives over for a housewarming celebration. It would damage the lawns. Rules are necessary when people live in close proximity, but rules are not the only consideration. I bet when they are showing potential buyers around, they make a point of taking people by the lovely garden, it is probably a selling point.
The 9th Annual Black Heritage Swim Meet {BV on Sports}
Jun 16th 2011 2:15PM The Lower East Side Neighborhood Association (LENA) in New York sponsors a summer camp for girls who are left out of the usual NYC programs. They may be new arrivals, or have parents who cannot meet the requirements for, say, the Police Athletic League camps.
Some of these inner city girls were a little afraid at first, but after a week of practice in the low end of the swimming pool, on the weekly trip to the beach which was their reward, most of them could swim safely.
We had problems with swimmers who were not used to the ocean, they panicked, but that had nothing to do with swimming ability, it was giving them a good introduction. My non-swimmers did not panic, they were fascinated that the water went way, way down, and things lived in it, and the water supported all the fish and all the people floating in it without ever getting tired. The program sounds wonderful, much more focused than mine, but if it teaches basic technique and works to reduce fright and panic at a new environment, it has drown-proofed the children.
Naomi Campbell in race row over Cadbury chocolate {BV Black Spin}
Jun 1st 2011 3:45PM It's more than disrespect. Her name has commercial value, and for it to be used in an ad for a product without specifically getting permission and paying, is fraud. She needs a good lawyer as well as good friends. She needs to protect her "brand" just as much as Disney does.
42nd Annual NAACP Image Awards Red Carpet Style {BV on Style}
Mar 5th 2011 2:25PM I am getting more and more tired of women's fashions that make us look like emaciated nursing mothers -- skin and bone up to the bulging teats.
I am really glad that about half the women were nicely proportioned, didn't look like they had gotten dressed and then had someone pump up their top half.
Shomari Stone: Black Journalist Saves White Supremacist in a Fight {BV Black Spin}
Mar 4th 2011 2:03PM At 75, I might not have jumped in, but I remember a few years ago, on a Sunday morning, on the street across from my church (St. Augustine's Episcopal Church, 29th & Telegraph, Oakland) a white man, homeless, and his girlfriend got into an argument. The baby buggy, with the baby in it, went into the street. Some bystanders called the police, and a church member pulled the baby buggy out of the street before crossing to go into church. The police arrived and were going to arrest the man. The young family had received charity from the church women's food pantry, so they were known. The women sent the men, the church choir which was rehearsing, across the street to protect/rescue the boy. These middle-aged to elderly black men, in choir robes, surrounded the police car and insisted on having the whole issue talked out before any arrest was made. Whoever made the call eloped, was not available to give testimony, and other witnesses did not agree that it was a deliberate shove that sent the baby buggy downhill and into the street. Eventually, the police called headquarters and described what was happening. They were told to let the man go, with a warning, and everyone trooped back across the street and into church, while the officers watched. The service actually started on time, and the singing was inspired. So intervening on behalf of anyone who is in trouble is a common black phenomenon, and while police dislike it, they do not want community involvment, they tend to honor it.
Controversial Anti-Abortion Billboard Targeting Black Women Gets Taken Down {BV Black Spin}
Feb 26th 2011 4:36PM I don't know why you "abhor" Planned Parenthood, maybe you or someone you know had a very bad experience. However, for most of last century and for most women, Planned Parenthood was the only way to get factual information about pregnancy. When I discovered I could not communicate with my teenage daughter about sex, I took her to the local Clinic, where they listened carefully to what she thought she knew, answered all her questions, showed her a lot of stuff she had never ever thought about, and basically spent a whole day, including lunch, being concerned about a single rebellious child, including preparing her for an adult life of sexual health and happiness. That is the only time I had a direct contact with Planned Parenthood, and they were wonderful to her. I have heard stories from women in states such as Connecticut, where it was illegal for doctors even to discuss contraception, who were surreptitiously referred to a Planned Parenthood clinic, where the staffers were willing to risk prison time to five life-saving information to women.
Author Explores Lives of 'Practice Babies' Once Raised on College Campuses {ParentDish}
Feb 25th 2011 8:54PM In the early 1940s, the children of war workers were often treated in similar ways. It was a delightful experience, what I remember of it, and my younger brother and sister certainly had no problems being the center of attention from several high school or college students. Today, similar programs are used by Humane Societies to ready puppies for adoption, and fostering young animals or even older animals is considered a "best practice" by animal lovers. Humans are animals, after all, and the best way to raise a well-socialized animal is not to have it exclusively attached to one person, but to have it exposed, in a friendly way, to many different people of different ages and styles. We manufacture a lot of "neurotic" or "psychoaffective" disorders to say that people with different styles are "abnormal", but we seem to ignore that people with the many different backgrounds grow up totally normal. Since there is no evidence of any problems, maybe all those people who think there would have been real problems are just fantasizing.
Was Media Mogul Cathy Hughes Hypocritical in Her Attack on Halle Berry and Mo'Nique? -- Video {BV on Money}
Feb 12th 2011 10:55PM There are probably not more than a dozen films made in the entire world each year that are not trash. If the actors/actresses want to work, they read the lines written by a writer in the way they are told to by a director, and the whole thing is paid for by a producer who has done a lot of research on what amount of money different kinds of trans will earn. That's like blaming the busboy because the food was bad in a restaurant.
