Pharell had a bunch of tattoos removed

Don't bother to get all those tattoos in the first place. Who wants to go to this much trouble and pain to remove them ?

New Vendors At NYC Schools Must Cut Kids' Calories

Good news for health conscious parents and students who need reduced calorie diets. At least the temptation will be removed from school. For many years schools were being hypocritical to children by teaching about good healthy choices and still had soda machines, flavored beverages in machines filled with sugar, while others sold candy, cakes and other sweets daily as fundraisers. Below is an excerpt from the Gothamist. To read the full article click on the link above.

...Starting next fall, beverages sold in elementary and middle schools will be limited to a maximum of 10 calories per ounce in 8-ounce beverages, while high school students will be permitted 25 calories per ounce. As Snapple's controversial $40 million vending contract comes to an end, the DOE plans to ban juices and other beverages with artificial colors or flavors, the Post reports. It's all part of a crusade to combat what many deem a childhood "obesity epidemic," and the city is now seeking proposals from new vendors who must limit their snack selection to items under 200 calories, with less than 200 mg. of sodium and less than 10 percent saturated fat....

Should Sexting Be a Crime?

(Taken from an email I received from Common Sense Media)

I would love to think that "sexting" was only a theoretical issue in my family, but with two teens constantly using their cell phones, I can't make any promises that one of them hasn't sent off a racy snapshot or two (after all, 22% of teens say they have...). But I bet they didn't think they'd have to register as sex offenders if the police ever got hold of one of their sexts...

Mentacide: What exactly is it?

I came across a very interesting concept today so of course I had to investigate. i came across the word mentacide and was absolutely clueless except I knew it had to do with the mind and also with some type of destruction. Other than that I was clueless. So I googled it and discovered it is explained thoroughly in a book written by Mwalimu K. Bomani Baruti. I recommend that you check it it out. The description below is taken from his website called Akoben House.

Mentacide and other essays
Mentacide occurs when you willingly think and act out of someone else's interpretation of reality to their benefit and against your survival. It is a state of subtle insanity which, over the last few hundred years, has come to characterize more and more Afrikans globally. This collection of essays addresses various aspects of this self-negating confusion. For we, as an Afrikan people, cannot possibly attain an independent, self-sustaining empowerment without a clear understanding of who we are and are not. We cannot be someone else and ourselves at the same time, especially when that someone else is hell-bent on destroying us. For that reason, a number of these essays look into this confusion by critiquing our refusal to accept responsibility for consciously rearing our children, the political treason of some of the intellectuals who still pretend to speak for us, the flight of our emotions from european faiths to Afrikan spiritual systems designed to cater to our unchanged european ways and the systematic incarceration of our men and women and boys and girls

Free and Inexpensive Media Classes

I copied this information to share with you from their Blog page.

March 19, 2009...2:17 pm
Brooklyn Center for Media Education Spring 2009 Classes Announced
Jump to Comments
Hooray! The Spring 2009 Brooklyn Center for Media Education classes and workshops have been announced.
Not familiar with the Brooklyn Center for Media Education? Well, now you can be! Here’s a brief tutorial:
Training over 500 Brooklynites a year, the Brooklyn Center for Media Education provides media services, educational classes, and mentoring programs that enable Brooklyn residents to produce their own television programs. Brooklyn residents and individuals representing Brooklyn organizations, ages 18 and over, can enroll in the Brooklyn Center for Media Education’s low-cost classes to learn television and multimedia production. Upon successful completion of basic courses, students become BCAT Media Center Certified Producers and have free access to equipment they’ve trained on to produce programs for cablecast on Brooklyn Free Speech TV.
Nice.
It’s very simple to take a class at the Brooklyn Center for Media Education. First, you need to attend an Orientation*:
Orientation (2 hours) Cost: FREE (Space available on a first-come, first-served basis)
§ Tuesday, April 7, 6pm-8pm
§ Saturday, April 11, 11:30am-1:30pm
§ Tuesday, May 5, 6pm-8pm
§ Saturday, May 16, 11:30am-1:30pm
§ Tuesday, June 2, 6pm-8pm
§ Saturday, June 6, 11:30am-1:30pm
§ Tuesday, July 7, 6pm-8pm
§ Saturday, July 18, 11:30am-1:30pm

(*The CME Literary Series does not require an orientation.. learn more about these seminars below!)
Then you take a look at the classes we’ve got and decide which one you want to take… (Deciding is the hard part– they all look so darn good.)

Click on the link above for more details including costs, class schedule and requirement.

Only Place to see Historic Stevie Wonder Concert

Only Place To See Historic Stevie Wonder Concert is by the Library of Congress. The video is approx. 55 minutes. This Library of Congress honored Stevie Wonder as he was awarded the Library Of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song. Stevie performed a piece that the library commissioned him to do for the first time. Most people only know about his R & B music that plays on the radio and they don't pay attention to his composing skills. The piece he performed was called "Sketches of a Life". This webcast will show you another side to the 'Wonder' that we know and love as Stevie Wonder. VIEW THE WEBCAST HERE. It’s definitely worth watching. He performed the piece with a an orchestra of talented performers and he played different instruments which was wonderful. At one point he played the harmonica and believe me when I tell you that it sounded like a classic wind instrument found in an orchestra. At the end there were two encores in which he did familiar songs, which shows just how wonderful it was.

After viewing let me know what you think of the piece?

Cool Sites for Parents, Students and Educators

Here are a few sites that are worth the visit for parents, students and educators. The Smithsonian has created virtual tours for parents, teachers and students to learn about and explore African American and Latino History. Another resource is The Library of Congress. It is the nation's research arm of Congress. It is also the oldest federal cultural institution and it is also the largest library in the world, with millions of books, recordings, photographs, maps and manuscripts in its collections.

http://latino.si.edu/education/LVM_Main.htm (for Latino history)
http://www.smithsonianeducation.org/heritage_month/index.html (for African American history)
http://www.loc.gov/about/ (Library of Congress)

Drugging of Our Children by Gary Null

Click the video link below on this page to see a very important video by Gary Null on The Drugging of Our Children. What doctors are doing to them that creates disturbing outcomes. When we hear about drugs we don't immediately think of children and we certainly don't think that our children are being harmed by doctors. Check out this very informative video.

$50 Netbooks

Check out this article by ConsumerReports.org.

FIRST MULTI-STORY GREEN INDUSTRIAL FACILITY

Check out this article: Mayor Bloomberg Opens Nation's First Multi-Story Green Industrial Facility and Announces New Green Manufacturing Plant at Brooklyn Navy Yard

'Sexting' lands teen on sex offender list

I just became aware of something called sexting that is very disturbing to me. Apparently this is a growing trend among many teenagers. As the mother of three teenagers I am very troubled by this apparently new trend. My children, thank God, have not sent any naked or sexual pictures of themselves or their friends by texting or on the Internet. However, when I asked about it they admitted that their friends have sent jokes of a sexual nature by text to them. We have a very open relationship, which I am grateful for, so it is easy for me to speak to them about this. I had to show them the article and told them to make sure their friends know that they should not send such things because the consequences could be great. Some teens have been charged with pornography and made to register as a sex offenders. Their whole future just gets screwed up over this nonsense.
Give your kids a heads up on this because teenagers do things like this for fun, for retaliation or for spite against someone and then they end up getting a criminal record. It is very disturbing that so many children are being locked up for this type of 'teenage mischief'. There has to be a better way to teach them to be more responsible instead of putting them in jail where they only learn how to become real criminals instead of learning how to be responsible young adults.