Thank you JT and Papa… the love of my life and my maternal grandfather, who served in the United States Navy and United States Army during the Persian Gulf War and World War II, respectively.

Thank you to all other veterans for protecting our freedom and serving your country with honor.

Happy Veterans Day.

Presidential Proclamation for Veterans Day 2007: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/10/20071031-6.html

Just under two weeks ago, JT and I saw a news report on Fox 2 St. Louis about a new free drug program at Schnucks Pharmacy. The prescription is free regardless of insurance provider.

The free Prescription Drug Program for Generic Oral Antibiotics includes up to a 21-day supply, as well as prescribed refills, of the following seven classes of antibiotics:

For Drug Descriptions and Item Sizes included in the program go to the site and click on a drug title for more information:

• Amoxicillin (Generic for Amoxil) – capsules and oral suspension

• Ampicillin – capsules and oral suspension

• Ciprofloxacin (Generic for Cipro) – tablets

• Doxycycline – capsules

• Erythromycin – tablets, oral suspension and capsules

• Penicillin – tablets and oral suspension

• Trimeth/Sulfa (Generic for Septra or Bactrim)

Schnucks Pharmacies are located throughout Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Mississippi, Missouri, Tennessee and Wisconsin. To find out if a location is near you go to: http://www.schnucks.com/stores/query.asp?pharmacy=Y&feature=pharmacy

I am very excited about this program. JT and I will be going to Schnucks tomorrow to get penicillin filled for William. Because he has sickle cell disease, he takes penicillin twice a day to help fight infection. He has been taking it since he was 2 months old.

Any money saved due to this free program will help out the family’s expenses.

Be very cautious when you receive such emails because these are scams and not from Bank of America. Always be aware of who the sender is. In this email you see that the sender is from update@yahoo.com. Bank of America does not use Yahoo to send emails. Also, Bank of America generally does not send such emails.

Here is the fraudulent email:

from Security Center
reply-to update@yahoo.com
date Sep 28, 2007 5:16 AM
subject *** Bank Of America Security Notice ***

Customer ID : 000-2232-6231386-PTS

This e-mail is to inform you that your account will be suspended within 48 hours due to your Account Inactivity. You will have to confirm certain Account Information in order to continue your account subscription.

Please click the link below to confirm your identity
(link removed so no one will click it)

You can help us provide you with the most relevant information by taking a moment to tell us your e-mail preferences.
And of course you can unsubscribe at any time.

Remember, we are committed to your security and protection. To find out more, take a look at our Information Security section under Privacy and Security on the Web site.

During May, I bought a lot of things from local stores in preparation of travel. Bank of America suspected fraudulent activity on my account because of the large amounts of purchases. As protection, my account was frozen. I received an email that said I had to call to verify my account, but the main difference was that I had to call not click on a funky looking link.

The bottom line is that, if you ever receive emails asking you to verify a bank account or any other account that involves money. Do not click it. Call your institution to inquire if you are a victim of a phishing scam.

I really hope that I can attend this event next Friday. On Friday, October 26, 2007, Senator Barack Obama will be at the Union Station. Doors open at 5:00 p.m. Union Station is right by my job and the timeframe would not conflict with my job because I get off before 5:00 p.m. We shall see…

The location is at:

Union Station
1820 Market Street
St. Louis, Missouri 63103

General Admission is $25 and Student Price is $15.

You can purchase tickets online at: http://donate.barackobama.com/C2Cstl

Also, you can contact Ravi Gupta at 202-543-5660 or rgupta AT barackobama.com

Countdown to Change…

There many forms of abuse such as, but not limited to: physical, sexual, emotional, verbal and economical abuse.

Emotional and pyschological abuse is often more subtle than physical and sexual abuse, but by no means is any less cruel. These types of abuse can sometimes go unseen, where the victim does not know he or she is actually being abused. The impact is detrimental, and can lead to short and long-term damage to the victim’s self-esteem and self-worth.

Examples of emotional abuse include yelling, blaming the victim for the abuser’s actions, name-calling and intimidation. These actions are manipulative but suprisingly, the victim may not be aware of the abuse. You do not have to have a busted lip in order to be abused. For instance, if your significant other has a bad day at work, comes home to take it out on you and the children, then twists everything around to where you think that you are the cause of the stress and bad day — then you are a victim of emotional and psychological abuse.

Domestic violence is very serious and should not be taken lightly. If you feel that you are a victim of emotional, psychological or any other type of abuse then you should seek help now. There are many warning signs and if you have questions about if you are a victim of abuse, then you should seek help now.

You can contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at: 1-800-799-SAFE (7233) or 1-800-787-3224 (TTY).

The 11th Hour is a documentary produced and narrated by Leonardo DiCaprio that examines the state of the global environment and how we can correct many of the problems that we created on our planet. From the official website, I see that the film has hit my city so I hope to check it out soon.

On September 27, 2007 join 1,000s of bloggers around the world in BlogCatalog’s Blogging for a Great Cause Challenge.

This Blogging Challenge will be: Bloggers Against Abuse September 27, 2007

The Outcome we are after is to be part of the largest group of bloggers to ever blog about an important cause, all on the same day.

So how do you participate?

On September 27, 2007, blog about putting an end to some sort of Abuse (you decide what kind of abuse to blog about).

In the meantime though,

* Spread the word among all the bloggers you know. Perhaps even give them a link to this Discussion.

* If you are a graphic’s designer, perhaps you can come up with some small badges announcing the event, that we can then place on our blogs. To share the badge, place it on this thread.

* List any organizations, on the above mentioned thread, who are involved in putting an end to abuse.

What do you get?

You will receive a link to your Blog Post from the Blogcatalog blog when we list everyone who participated.

You get to use your blog for an important cause.

You get to create blogging history.

There are more badges for this great cause here: http://blog.blogcatalog.com/announcements/blogging-for-a-great-cause-badges

You wouldn’t give your personal and private tax information to telemarketers. But they have it anyhow.

Are you OK with that?

They’ve Got Your Number. Including your Social Security Number.

Your sensitive tax information could be in the hands of a private tax debt collector.

Are you OK with that?

If not, let your Members of Congress know today.

Urge Congress to stop outsourcing your personal financial information. Vote “YES” on H.R. 695 and S. 335.

To email your Member of Congress go here: http://capwiz.com/nteu/issues/alert/?alertid=9270436&type=CO

There is a pre-drafted letter on Capwiz that you can email. If you prefer to call or write go to http://www.house.gov and search for your Congressman’s phone number and physical address.

To email your Senator go here: http://capwiz.com/nteu/issues/alert/?alertid=9267446&type=CO

There is a pre-drafted letter on Capwiz that you can email. If you prefer to call or write go to http://www.senate.gov and search for your Senator’s phone number and physical address.

Spread the word now.

Google Labs has launched a free toll-free local business search.

To try this service, just dial 1-800-GOOG-411 (1-800-466-4411) from any phone.

From Google Labs:

Using this service, you can:

get the details by SMS if you’re using a mobile phone.
Just say “text message”.

Google labs states that this project is in experimentatl stage. I love free services like this so I will definitely take advantage while it is available.

The cheat sheet is available here: http://labs.google.com/goog411/shortcuts.html

Source: http://labs.google.com/goog411/