GROUNDHOG Day 2k10 - other musings..

well the rat saw his shadow this morning- more of the icy stuff!!

Calvin & Hobbes creator/writer/artist Bill Watterson has given his first interview in 15 years. It's short and you can read it by clicking HERE. To me, he kinda comes off as a jerk at times. I can't explain it. He does say " I think some of the reason "Calvin and Hobbes" still finds an audience today is because I chose not to run the wheels off it. I'm proud of the strip, enormously grateful for its success, and truly flattered that people still read it, but I wrote "Calvin and Hobbes" in my 30s, and I'm many miles from there."

in other stuff--

I was sad to read about Hall of Fame wrestler Jack Brisco has died at the age of 68 following complications from open heart surgery. He had been in poor health for a number of months and collapsed a week ago while recovering from the operation. Brisco will always be renowned as one of the best pure wrestlers in the business.
Read more by clicking HERE

Defense Secretary Robert Gates is promising to try to spare more gay troops from being dismissed from the military while the Pentagon takes a year to study revising its "don't ask, don't tell" policy.

Earlier today, gay-rights campaigners and secularists called for protests during a visit to Britain by Pope Benedict XVI this year, after he condemned equality legislation seen as friendly to gays. The 82-year-old pontiff, who made his comments in a letter to the bishops of England and Wales on Monday, is reportedly set to visit Britain in September, the first such trip in 28 years.

After tasting 37 different blended coffees, Consumer Reports couldn't find one that measured up to its "excellent" or "very good" ratings, the publication said Tuesday. Ranking at the top of the list of 14 caffeinated blends -- earning a rating of "good" -- are the Starbucks House Blend, calculated at 26 cents per cup, and Green Mountain Signature Nantucket Blend Medium Roast, at 23 cents per cup. The highest score for the 13 decaffeinated coffees also failed to reach the top two categories. The better scoring varieties included Allegro Organic Decaf, Blend Medium Dark, Peet's Decaf House Blend, Caribou Daybreak Coffee Morning Blend Decaf and Bucks County Decaf Breakfast blend. Consumer Reports has a rating criteria in which the tasters look for specific characteristics including the flavor and aroma.

A new study shows that healthy older adults need less sleep than their younger counterparts and, even with less sleep under their nightcaps, are less likely to feel tired during the day. The time spent actually sleeping out of eight hours in bed declined progressively and significantly with age. Older adults, aged 66-83, slept about 20 minutes less than middle-aged adults (40-55 years), who slept 23 minutes less than young adults aged 20-30, the study said. The older adults woke up significantly more often and spent more time awake after initial sleep onset than younger adults. Deep, or slow-wave sleep, thought to be the most restorative phase of sleep, decreased with age, the study said.

The science-fiction sensation "Avatar" and the Iraq war thriller "The Hurt Locker" lead the Academy Awards with nine nominations each, including best picture and director. For the first time since 1943 the Oscars feature 10 best-picture contenders instead of the usual five.

President Barack Obama is redirecting America's space program, killing NASA's $100 billion plans to return astronauts to the moon and using much of that money for new rocket technology research.

Iran said on Tuesday it would soon hang nine more rioters over the unrest that erupted after the June presidential vote, and the leader of the opposition said such repression showed the 1979 Islamic revolution had failed.

A Chinese activist who has spent more than three months living inside Tokyo's international airport said Tuesday that Chinese officials have given him permission to return home to China.

Officials with the California Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement say use of Twitter, MySpace, and Facebook are rising among gang members.

and finally...

And finally, a new study reveals why children may be bullied. Kids who get bullied and snubbed by peers may be more likely to have problems in other parts of their lives, past studies have shown. And now researchers have found at least three factors in a child's behavior that can lead to social rejection.


The factors involve a child's inability to pick up on and respond to nonverbal cues from their pals.


In the United States, 10 to 13 percent of school-age kids experience some form of rejection by their peers. In addition to causing mental health problems, bullying and social isolation can increase the likelihood a child will get poor grades, drop out of school, or develop substance abuse problems, the researchers say.


"It really is an under-addressed public health issue," said lead researcher Clark McKown of the Rush Neurobehavioral Center in Chicago.


And the social skills children gain on the playground or elsewhere could show up later in life, according to Richard Lavoie, an expert in child social behavior who was not involved with the study. Unstructured playtime - that is, when children interact without the guidance of an authority figure - is when children experiment with the relationship styles they will have as adults, he said.


Underlying all of this: "The number one need of any human is to be liked by other humans," Lavoie told LiveScience. "But our kids are like strangers in their own land." They don't understand the basic rules of operating in society and their mistakes are usually unintentional, he said.


Social rejection


In two studies, McKown and colleagues had a total of 284 children, ages 4 to 16 years old, watch movie clips and look at photos before judging the emotions of the actors based on their facial expressions, tones of voice and body postures. Various social situations were also described and the children were questioned about appropriate responses.


The results were then compared to parent/teacher accounts of the participants' friendships and social behavior.


Kids who had social problems also had problems in at least one of three different areas of nonverbal communication: reading nonverbal cues; understanding their social meaning; and coming up with options for resolving a social conflict.


A child, for example, simply may not notice a person's scowl of impatience or understand what a tapped foot means. Or she may have trouble reconciling the desires of a friend with her own. "It is important to try to pinpoint the area or areas in a child's deficits and then build those up," McKown explained.


Ways to help


When children have prolonged struggles with socializing, "a vicious cycle begins," Lavoie said. Shunned children have few opportunities to practice social skills, while popular kids are busy perfecting theirs. However, having just one or two friends can be enough to give a child the social practice he or she needs, he said.


Parents, teachers and other adults in a child's life can help, too. Instead of reacting with anger or embarrassment to a child who, say, asks Aunt Mindy if her new hairdo was a mistake, parents should teach social skills with the same tone they use for teaching long division or proper hygiene. If presented as a learning opportunity, rather than a punishment, children usually appreciate the lesson.


"Most kids are so desperate to have friends, they just jump on board," Lavoie said.


To teach social skills, Lavoie advises a five-step approach in his book "It's So Much Work to Be Your Friend: Helping the Child with Learning Disabilities Find Social Success" (Touchstone, 2006). The process works for children with or without learning disabilities and is best conducted immediately after a transgression has been made.


1) Ask the child what happened and listen without judgment.


2) Ask the child to identify their mistake. (Often children only know that someone got upset, but don't understand their own role in the outcome.)

3) Help the child identify the cue they missed or mistake they made, by asking something like: "How would you feel if Emma was hogging the tire swing?" Instead of lecturing with the word "should," offer options the child "could" have taken in the moment, such as: "You could have asked Emma to join you or told her you would give her the swing after your turn."

4) Create an imaginary but similar scenario where the child can make the right choice. For example, you could say, "If you were playing with a shovel in the sand box and Aiden wanted to use it, what would you do?"

5) Lastly, give the child "social homework" by asking him to practice this new skill, saying: "Now that you know the importance of sharing, I want to hear about something you share tomorrow."

The studies are detailed in the current issue of the Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology. They were funded by the Dean and Rosemarie Buntrock Foundation and the William T. Grant Foundation.