Aunty Sez - A San Francisco Treat

Angela signed up for Opera and mentioned it on FaceBook. She also posted my "San Francisco" blog post and I noticed that a bunch of images were broken. Of course, those images were hosted on my old blog, which got hacked and then retired. Opera blog requires that photos one uses is hosted elsewhere like at Flickr or on one's website. So what's new? Oh I hung out my astrology shingle.



I also volunteered to be the Publicity Director of the San Francisco Astrological Society and I wrote a blog post about that on the blog on my website.

New Publicity Director for the San Francisco Astrological Society


That volunteer position is so new the paint is still wet on the wall. I'm awaiting the files, mailing list, and unfinished tasks left over from the last volunteer. As I mentioned to the Judge at my divorce proceeding I was teaching myself Social Media Marketing, utilizing FaceBook, Twitter, Blog posts, to get information out about a product or service and broadcasting that through HootSuite. All that is mentioned in the blog post regarding the volunteer position. The divorce was final last September and this September marks the start of my early retirement with Social Security.

I can earn up to $14K a year without effecting my SS$. Beings that Boomers who have been out of the work force for a handful of years before the recession can't find a job to save their lives I had to reinvent myself. Hanging out my astrology shingle is one angle. Getting practice in utilizing SMM with the SFAS is another angle.

It's nice to be helpful to the family. I created my son's new website. Tosh Stone is my third born son and he teaches Kung Fu. He also moved in with me, bringing his girlfriend, when my ex-husband wandered off with his baby-momma. Tosh and Amy saved my life, helped me keep the apartment. He is rebuilding his Kung Fu teaching career after having taken a tumble in his life as well.

I don't know what I would have done if Tosh and Amy hadn't moved in with me. Once my SS$ comes in I'll be able to contribute more than I do now with the modest spousal support I got as the divorce settlement. Amy is going to school and she's doing so well I'm just thrilled for her. I never birthed a daughter so it is a delight to have her here and I bother her to no end to be my model for my crocheted hats. Oh where's that picture....



Last year a COCModSquad volunteer, Edie, sent me a big box of yarn. I mean a box the size of a washing machine. I fell in head first and didn't come up for air until I had made over a hundred hats. I created a new section on my website "Fiber and String" That picture of Amy was one of my early hats and it now resides with my neighbor, Jolly, who has a growing collection of my hats. My neighbors and girlfriends are all collecting my hats and that tickles me a lot.

What other news is there? Oh, I quit smoking! I had quit before I got married the last time but with a chain smoker in the apartment it was impossible to stay quit, or sell any polymer clay craft item because they all smelled like an ashtray. I'm so happy the apartment is now a non-smoking environment. I can knit, crochet, sew clothing, make jewelery and figurines, and they won't smell of cigarette smoke. YEAH!

The next thing to do is to lose the weight I put back on from quitting smoking. I'll report on that progress in my next blog post to this neglected blog.

As I had mentioned before this blog on Opera is a "spare blog" used as an example for a computer Yahoo Group I host for crafting grandmas. It is not my main blog. My main blog is a rebuilt affair because of two blogs having gotten hacked. I had the "Design Blog" exported so that copy got saved. My "Random Natterings" got hosed, but that's ok. I have Moon in Gemini square Mercury in Virgo and I can just write more stuff. Not a problem.

So there it is then. The update for the last year or so...

I'm going back to my former name of Nora Jean Stone. I've been making effort to update my profile picture here but it's not showing up yet. So I added it into my album.

So no more "Gatine" for me.

This blog is an example for CITY-Computers, a Yahoo Group for CITYzen crafters and artists to get a grip on their tech.

I don't use this blog all that much. It's set up as an example for the CITYzens of CITY-Computers at Yahoo Groups. I was going around updating the avatars I have online. The picture I have been using was taken in 2005 and it doesn't represent me now.

Oh I just noticed I got an angry comment on my sharing "California the poorest state". I hate to burst the commentor's bubble but California school systems rank 48th out of 50 in the United States. It isn't the best as the commentor maintained. The article I shared said "when you're poor in California, you're really poor." meaning the price of housing and everything else is so high that getting out of poverty is expecially difficult. There's just too many of us here in California.

I've been to Mississippi, my father was born and died in Mississippi, and sure, he paid $200 a month for a broken down doublewide in Jackson. That's rental in Jackson. A one bedroom here in San Francisco goes for over $1,500, if you can find one. If I lived on a fixed income I'd move to a state where the over all cost of living was less expensive. But then again the hustle potential there is lower in equal portion.

San Francisco used to be a blue collar town, good union town, where working families could find a job that paid a wage that could get the family a rental. Those days are gone. I didn't come up with the stats in that article, silly goose boy. I just shared them. So don't get all high and mighty on my blog, like I care, it took me a year to get around to seeing it.

By Naomi Kim
From Yahoo News


TORONTO, Dec 13 (Reuters Life!) - Never mind how careful you are behind the wheel or how long you've been driving, the signs of the zodiac may be bigger factors behind your ability to avoid car crashes -- or why you have too many.

According to a study by InsuranceHotline.com, a Web site that quotes drivers on insurance rates, astrological signs are a significant factor in predicting car accidents.

The study, which looked at 100,000 North American drivers' records from the past six years, puts Libras (born September 23-October 22) followed by Aquarians (January 20-February 18) as the worst offenders for tickets and accidents

Leos (July 23-August 22) and then Geminis (May 21-June 20) were found to be the best overall.

"I was absolutely shocked by the results," said Lee Romanov, president of Toronto-based InsuranceHotline.com, who also wrote the book "Car Carma" which touches on the correlation between astrological signs and driving ability while doing the study.

Romanov originally wanted to have some fun by examining astrological signs as a possible cause for the variance between insurance companies quoting high and low rates but didn't expect to find anything interesting.

"Now, changing postal codes is far less significant to me than drivers of certain astrological signs," she told Reuters on Wednesday.

Even age, another variable for determining insurance rates, is less of a consideration to Romanov. The cutoff line for being considered a higher risk driver is 24 years of age; 25-year-olds are considered not-high risk.

"I'd rather get into a car with a 24-year-old Leo than a 25-year-old Aries," Romanov said.

Leos, described along with the study results on InsuranceHotline.com/a10.html, are "generous, and comfortable in sharing the roadway."

Aries, on the other hand, "have a 'me first' childlike nature that drives Aries into trouble."

"I wasn't believing in it before," said Romanov, "but I would think twice before getting into a car with an Aries."

I could have told them that and saved them the cost of the study. Think about how it was when they were housing new military recruits by birthday. A barracks full of Geminis all talking at once into the middle of the night. LOL

Calif. Sues carmakers over global warming

By Michael Kahn


SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - California sued six of the world's largest automakers over global warming on Wednesday, charging that greenhouse gases from their vehicles have caused billions of dollars in damages.


The lawsuit is the first of its kind to seek to hold manufacturers liable for the damages caused by their vehicles' emissions, state Attorney General Bill Lockyer said.

It also comes less than a month after California lawmakers adopted the nation's first global warming law mandating a cut in greenhouse gas emissions.

An automaker trade group called the global warming move a "nuisance suit." Car manufacturers have also held up California state rules to force cuts in tailpipe emissions from cars and trucks with legal action of their own.

The lawsuit names General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co., Toyota Motor Corp., the Chrysler Motors Corp. U.S. arm of Germany's DaimlerChrysler AG and the North American units of Japan's Honda Motor Co. and Nissan Motor Co. Ltd..

"(California) just passed a new law to cut global warming emissions by 25 percent and that's a good start and this lawsuit is a good next step," said Dan Becker, director of the Sierra Club's Global Warming Program.

Lockyer told Reuters he would seek "tens or hundreds of millions of dollars" from the automakers in the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Northern California.

The lawsuit seeks monetary damages for past and ongoing contributions to global warming and asks that the companies be held liable for future monetary damages to California.

It noted that California is spending millions to deal with reduced snow pack, beach erosion, ozone pollution and the impact on endangered animals and fish.

"The injuries have caused the people to suffer billions of dollars in damages, including millions of dollars of funds expended to determine the extent, location and nature of future harm and to prepare for and mitigate those harms, and billions of dollars of current harm to the value of flood control infrastructure and natural resources," it said.

Ford deferred comment to the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, which called the complaint a "nuisance suit" similar to one a New York court dismissed.

"Automakers will need time to review this legal complaint, however, a similar nuisance suit that was brought by attorneys- general against utilities was dismissed by a federal court in New York," the industry group said in a statement.

Toyota declined to comment as the company evaluates the lawsuit. The other automakers had no immediate comment.

David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research, a nonprofit organization that provides public research and forecasts into the industry, said it would be tough for the industry to immediately meet demands from some critics.

Adoption of diesel engine emissions technology or gasoline- electric hybrids comes at great cost and improving gas mileage also likely means smaller lighter vehicles, trade-offs that are not attractive to consumers, he added.

"These are not free technologies, they are very expensive," Cole said. "Most people are price sensitive."

In the complaint, Lockyer charges that vehicle emissions have contributed significantly to global warming and have harmed the resources, infrastructure and environmental health of the most populous state in the United States.

Lockyer -- a Democratic candidate for state treasurer in the November election -- said the lawsuit states that under federal and state common law the automakers have created a public nuisance by producing "millions of vehicles that collectively emit massive quantities of carbon dioxide."

Carbon dioxide emissions and other greenhouse gases have been linked to global warming.