The Up Series and Us

I write this post on the first day of the 2008-09 school year. I want to use this moment to remind you that this blog is for the members of the Park School class of '08. It is a place where you are welcome to post anything that strikes your fancy. I think that this may be especially important now that you are all in different school and aren't together anymore.

So far, I've written about 95% of the posts. I did that because I knew that most of you were doing summer type things and that posting to a blog was one of the farthest things from your minds. I posted then, to keep the blog moving forward.

Now, it's your turn. I'll be posting less frequently because I'll be busy with school, so it's your turn to take up the baton.

Here's what I'd really like to see:

The "Up Series" is famous set of documentaries which started in 1964 by following a group of seven year old kids.


Every seven years after that, the filmakers do an update.


Three of the girls, Jackie, Lynn and Sue, age 7.


the same girls, age 14


and again, age 21

The last one they did came out in 2006, when the "kids" turned 49. Cool, huh?

I thought that we could try something like that. Now, I don't mean to keep going until you're 49, but maybe we can keep this going until you get out of high school. All we have to do to make it work is to keep posting.

Spa Camp

Well, now we know how some of you spent this summer...

What follows is from the San Francisco Chronicle of Sunday August 24:

There's apparently no limit to how far a girl will go in pursuit of beauty, even if it means licking her own feet.

The cocoa-yogurt foot paste on Chloe Jacobs' toes wasn't meant to be ingested, but the all-natural pedicure treatment at Flying Beauticians spa in Mill Valley was, as owner Nona Daron had promised, made of foodstuffs found in an everyday kitchen and as safe to eat as to put on one's exterior.

It didn't hurt that Chloe, being all of 11, was inclined to be a little silly, especially after Daron had jokingly egged her on.


Chloe Jacobs, 11, licks off her edible foot paste.

Oh, the things that happen at summer camp - and what a camp Daron ran for tweens this summer in Marin: a "spa campaign," or beauty school that sought to teach girls about health and beauty from the inside out.

While other children were finishing sessions at tennis camp, science camp or Bible camp, a handful of girls in the affluent Marin County enclave - the daughters of financiers, engineers, consultants and the like - were learning about the benefits of footbaths with warm water, lavender and sea salt; honey, sea salt and ground ginger foot scrub; and foot massages with olive oil and avocado paste. Manicures followed on Tuesday, lessons on sunscreen on Wednesday, yoga and meditation on Thursday, and more massage treatments - for anyone the girls wanted to bring in and practice their new skills on - on Friday.

It was the second session of its kind Daron offered this summer - five days of training from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., for $375 per person (lunch not included).

In addition to the pampering, there were hourlong morning hikes and other activities designed to help girls of an impressionable age learn that presenting a confident, attractive self to the world does not revolve entirely around slathering oneself with the latest expensive creams, lipsticks or perfumes.


Kim Juarez (far right) leads campers on a daily hike.

"This camp is about simple things we can do to make ourselves feel good," Daron told six middle schoolers. "It's not about how you look on the outside, it's about the inside. If you're healthy and confident, your beauty will shine through."

Daron, whose mother was an aesthetician in Russia, owned her own spa in San Francisco for 15 years before setting up a second branch in Mill Valley three years ago. The summer camp, she said, is a way to give back to the community. The pricing offsets the closure of the spa to all other customers during the six-hour period.

To Daron's credit, she used only products found in a typical kitchen cupboard, rather than promoting brands sold in her store - with the exception of fingernail polish, "something I can't make myself." She also enlisted the help of Kim Juarez, owner of fitness center Team Lola, to lead girls on their morning hikes and talk about nutrition, and Michelle Lawton, of Stretch the Imagination, to teach yoga.


This was no group of newbies, but a sophisticated bunch of 10- to 13-year-olds. All had received manicures and pedicures before. When Daron brought up the subject of women subjecting themselves to severe discomfort for the sake of beauty, most had already heard about Chinese foot-binding practices. One even knew the various pressure points on the foot that promoted relief of spinal pain.

"How do you know that?" Daron asked.

"I've had reflexology," said May Congdon, 13, an eighth-grader at Marin Country Day School.

At times, the camp operated more like a daytime slumber party, with girls giggling at the prospect of mashing avocadoes and olive oil in a bowl with their feet to prepare a paste for massage.

"Please, don't tickle me!" squealed Chloe Jacobs, 11, a student at Mill Valley Middle School, as Darcy Groves, 11, rubbed a sea salt paste onto her feet.

"I'm exfoliating!" corrected Darcy, another Marin Country Day School student.

As a group, the girls acknowledged that they already are feeling the pressure to conform, both from cliques who ostracize them for no apparent reason and from the media's body image standards.

"I'm a twig," said Ryann Morris, 13, an eighth-grader at Marin Country Day School. "I've always been a twig. It's annoying. Nothing fits me."

But, they added, their mothers try to combat those negative messages with more positive ones, even if the old refrain "It's not what's on the outside, but what's on the inside" elicits groans.

That's not to say that the camp's messages didn't seep in, at least a little.

In June, Bailey and Jordan Chavez, students at Mill Valley Middle School, attended the first session, and they said they had learned much about nutrition and have changed their eating habits since.

"I eat a lot less junk food since then," Bailey, 11, said. "Our family has a sweet tooth. Of course, when you have a sweet tooth you love eating candy. It was hard for us, but we cut down on a lot of sweets, and on the amount we eat."

"I feel a lot better," Jordan, 13, said, "because I know I'm not having all those calories."

At 2 p.m. Monday, however, it was the second round of campers who were busy at work when spa regular Jayne Greenberg, an event planner in town, walked in to make an appointment for a brow waxing.

"Is this closed for a private party?" she inquired.

"No, it's spa camp," she was told.

"Spa camp? I've never heard of it before," she said. "Only in Mill Valley."

Man Uses Barbie Fishing Rod to Make Record Catch

Aug 22, 2:51 AM EDT

ELKIN, N.C. (AP) -- David Hayes' granddaughter had just asked him to hold her Barbie rod and reel while she went to the bathroom. He did. Seconds later, he landed a 21 pounds, 1 ounce channel catfish. It was the largest channel cat ever caught in North Carolina.

Alyssa's father bought her the pink Barbie fishing rod for Christmas. She had caught a few bluegill before her grandfather hauled in the catfish.

Hayes and his granddaughter have been fishing in the pond behind his house since she was big enough to hold a pole.

Hayes said his granddaughter worried he would break her rod. He landed the 21-pound fish on a 6-pound test line. It was 32 inches long, 2 inches longer than the rod.

The Dumbest Hoax Of All Time?

Early this month, two hunters from Georgia claimed to have found a dead Bigfoot. They even had photos to prove it.

This news caused a national sensation. Proof that a mythical creature exists! Closer examination (and not really all that close) showed otherwise.

First of all, both of the photos supposedly showing the bigfoot were out of focus. In this day and age of auto-focus digital cameras with instant photo previews and scores of photo enhancing software programs, how is this even possible? If you're really trying to prove something to someone, don't you take the best pictures you can?

One of the photos shows the body in a pool of water at the bottom of a freezer:


"It was in a block of ice", claimed the hunters, "the water is what is left of the ice."

While the other is supposed to be a picture of the creature's mouth:


In press conference broadcast nationwide, the hunters claimed that the body was at "an undisclosed location, awaiting examination by qualified experts."

The hunters did, however take a tissue sample, which they sent for a DNA test.

The test proved that Bigfoot was an oppossum. Oops.

A couple of days later, an expert was able to examine the body.

It turned out to be a rubber costume.

Did these guys really think they were going to fool people? They must have had a few too many beers.

One of the hunters was a policeman. After this was over, he got fired.

The Cocoanut Grove Revisited

The 1942 Cocoanut Grove fire (See "An Answer and a New Puzzle" 8/7) started when a waiter, searching for something on the floor in a dark corner of the room, lit a match. Some paper decorations then caught fire. The fire quickly spread throughout the club. Customers got trapped inside. 492 people died.

Three things caused the customers to get trapped:

1. The main entrance was a revolving door. Panicked customers trying to get out clogged the door, preventing it from opening.
2. A door leading to a side street was locked.
3. A window facing the main street was boarded up.

As a result of this tragedy, building codes throughout the USA were changed. The new rules were:

1. Revolving doors had to have a regular door next to them.
2. All regular doors had to be unlocked while the building was open to the public.
3. All regular doors had to open outward.

The next time you are in a public building, check to see if these rules are being followed.

Rare Dolphins Caught on Film

These were just discovered in 2005. This is the first known videotape of them...

A Previously Unknown Population of 125,000 Gorillas Discovered in the Congo

Western Lowland Gorillas are considered a critically endangered species, that is, a species on the verge of extinction. This was a completely unexpected discovery, but doesn't mean the gorillas are safe, especially now that the whole world knows they're there...

Caveat Emptor

Having the Olympics in China has lead to a lot of stories about the country which is very, very different from the USA. A lot of these stories have to do with the strange things you can buy (fried scorpions, anyone?) and the bargain prices one pays for them.

But, as anyone who's been to China can tell you, there is a catch. The catch is that what you think is a bargain may really be just a fake. If you find a high quality fake, you may still feel you got a good deal. If not, well....

The first time my family went to Hong Kong, my parents went on a shopping spree. My dad was especially interested in buying a gold watch band for his Rolex. Gold products, if you could find real ones, were much cheaper in Hong Kong than they were in the United States.

My dad, with my mom, my two brothers and my sister tagging along, visited many, many jewelry stores in search of the perfect watch band. After a couple of days, my dad found one in which the shopkeeper spoke the same dialect (there are hundreds of different versions of the Chinese language - dialects - spoken in China, though the official language is Mandarin) as he did. Through this common bond and persistent haggling (everything is negotiable in China) my dad was able to strike what seemed like an incredible bargain for an imitation Rolex watch band made of gold.


"This is gold, right?" my dad asked, just before leaving.

"Yes, yes, Hong Kong gold!" replied the shopkeeper. "If you don't like, you bring back!"

We left the store and walked back to our hotel. Once we got there, we found an old man outside selling jade jewelry that he'd spread out on a blanket.

Still excited from getting such a deal on the watch band, my dad started haggling for some jade rings. After several offers and counteroffers, my dad, satisfied that he'd worked the old man down to a rock bottom price, purchased a jade ring for each of us. We walked away happy.


A couple of days later, we left Hong Kong for Tokyo and after that, Honolulu. My dad, proud of his flashy watchband, wore the Rolex everywhere we went, including to the beach.

One day, while sitting on the beach, my dad decided to go for a swim. In order to do so, he had to take off his watch. When he did, he discovered that the moist tropical air had turned the inside of the watchband green.

It was made of brass.

When we got home, my dad decided to test the rings. After all if a shopkeeper could sell fake gold, what would a street vendor do? The test was to throw the rings in hot oil. If they were real jade, they would keep their color. If not, the oil would dissolve the green dye.

We tossed all of the rings into the oil at once.

They all turned white.

The moral of the story? Caveat Emptor - latin for "let the buyer beware"

Epilogue: The following year, we returned to Hong Kong. While there, we visited the store where my dad bought the watchband. The same guy was there and greeted us warmly. My dad started yelling at him (in his own dialect). The shopkeeper first hid in the back of the store, but once he realized my dad wasn't going to leave, came out, took the watchband and refunded my dad's money. A week later, we traveled to Singapore, where my dad found a 24 karat gold imitation Rolex watchband that he has to this day.

We never saw the old jade vendor again.

Who the Heck is That?

So I had some carpet cleaned a couple of weeks ago. I wasn't home, so I had them send me a bill. I got the bill yesterday.

It was addressed to "Alan R Thong"...

my one and only summer trip

Even though it was my only trip, it was a great trip. First I went to Denver CO for a worldwide ice skating completion. I did a solo, 3 team, and couples events; I won two 1st place medals, two 4th place medals, and one 3rd place medals. After that I went to Boston for 4 days and saw Harvard, which is a really nice school but really hard to get into. Then I went to Washington DC for 3 more days. I saw the monuments and went to another collage for my brother to see, Georgetown.

Luckiest Kid in the World? Baby Born on 8/8/08 at 8:08; 8 pounds, 8 ounces

FERGUS FALLS, Minn. — Hailey Jo Hauer was born on the eighth day of the eighth month in 2008 at 8:08 a.m. So it wouldn't make sense for her to weigh anything other than 8 pounds, 8 ounces.

Lindsey Hauer thought staff at Lake Region Hospital in Minnesota were joking when they told her the time of her daughter's birth. Then she got a call from the birthing suite noting Hailey's weight.

Nurse Jenny Harstad joked that she tried to shrink the baby to 18 inches from her actual 19.5 inches.

Several hospital staff members pledged to buy lottery tickets.

An Answer and a New Puzzle

Awhile back I posed a question about a kid, a beard and an all night party (see Brain Teasers - The All Night Party). Don't know how many people read it, but here's the answer:

The boy lived in Barrow, Alaska, which is the northernmost town in the United States. In Barrow, after the sun sets in mid-November, it doesn't rise again for 65 days - plenty of time for the boy to grow a beard.

Here's a new one:



There was a nightclub in Boston called the Coconut Grove. In 1942, a fire broke out inside the club. 492 people died. Most of the victims died because a simple design flaw trapped them inside the building. What was the design flaw?

The Luckiest Day of the Century?

I've been getting a lot of chain emails from you guys. Each email promises that all kinds of good things will happen to me if I'd just forward the email to my friends. It's all just superstition, of course, but most of us forward the emails anyway, just in case. Besides, the emails promise dire consequences if we don't. Well, just so you know, I never forward these emails, and I'm still here...

Anyway, this got me to thinking about luck and superstition. You see, as a Chinese American kid, I learned that many Chinese are great believers in numbers, symbols and colors as bearers or indicators of luck or fortune.

For example, many Chinese businesses have red or gold colors as part of its decor. That's because red represents longevity and gold represents prosperity. Many Chinese business names contain the words "Golden", "Lucky" or "Dragon" in them for superstitious reasons.

Then, there are numbers. The number 4 is considered very bad luck. That's because the pronunciation of the number (roughly "say" in Cantonese) is the same as the word for death. A few years ago I was all set to buy a house until my parents talked me out of it, insisting that it was a bad luck house. The reason? Its address was 44 Morningside Dr.

The number 8, on the other hand, is considered very lucky. That's because its pronunciation is the same as that for the Chinese word for fortune or prosperity.

Chinese believe in this so strongly that, in China, the phone number 8888-8888 sold for $270,723. Each year, many weddings take place on August 8th.


This year, the Olympics are taking place in Beijing, China. They will officially begin this Friday on what Chinese believe to be the luckiest day of this century, 8/8/08, at 8 p.m.

Studies Find 4 out of 5 Sunscreens Inadequate, Can Harm Wildlife

Don't want to scare you guys, but sunscreen has been in the news lately, and it isn't all that good. Read the following article excerpts, then come back and cut and paste the links below to find out 1) which sunscreens actually work, and 2) which sunscreens do the least harm to wildlife. Then, try to use a sunscreen which appears both lists.

If you spend a lot of time in the sun, use of a good sunscreen is very important. Effective sunscreens protect your skins against both kinds of ultra violet rays, which reduces your risk of skin cancer and delays the development of wrinkles.

Also, please note that even if you don't go to the beach, the sunscreen you use will eventually find it's way to the ocean. That's because water treatment plants don't filter out the chemicals in sunscreen.

Sunscreens ranked by effectiveness (the lower the score, the better): www.cosmeticsdatabase.com/special/sunscreens2008/findyoursunscreen.php?nothanks=1

Sunscreens that don't harm coral reefs:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/06/13/BAL21103UD.DTL

Burning questions raised over sunsceens' effectiveness

When temperatures soar past the century mark around the Bay Area, people head for the beach with all of the usual gear in tow. Think towels, Frisbees, coolers, umbrellas. And sunscreen.

Oceans of it.

Americans will spend more than $1.1 billion on sun protection products this year, a market that's grown by an annual rate of 10 percent since 2004.

But is it worth it?

A recent study from the Environmental Working Group, a nonprofit research organization based in Washington, D.C., found that 4 out of 5 sunscreens offer inadequate protection against harmful rays or could contain harmful chemicals.

While most of these products do help against sunburn, the question of skin cancer is more troubling. Our increasing efforts to slather on the sunscreen have had little effect on the prevalence of melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer.

If anything, the rate of contracting skin cancer is holding steady. Among young white American women, in fact, it's actually trending up, according to the National Cancer Institute.

Many medical experts are starting to question the efficacy of sunscreen in fighting cancer, despite protests from an industry that stands by its products.

"There is no evidence that sunscreens work against melanoma," said Dr. Marianne Berwick, who specializes in melanoma and heads the Division of Epidemiology at University of New Mexico.

Sunscreen's a Bleach for Aquatic Life

Plopping down on the beach slathered from head to toe with sunscreen may help with the carcinoma, but the inevitable cooling dip in the ocean won't be good for the coral.

The creams that sunbathers use to ward off cancer-causing ultraviolet rays cause bleaching in coral reefs and seem to accumulate in fish and other aquatic life, according to recent studies.

The discovery creates a catch-22 for pale-skinned, sun-worshiping environmentalists who love to snorkel. But it is a particular problem for the environment because sunscreen is used almost everywhere on Earth, and it invariably ends up in the water.

"Almost 80 percent of our water in the U.S. shows trace amounts of chemicals from personal care products, which could be sunscreens, lotions, colognes or medications," said Sejal Choksi, the program director for Baykeeper, an environmental watchdog group.

A recent study authorized by the European Commission found that the chemical compounds that filter ultraviolet radiation in cream-based sunscreens caused bleaching in coral reefs.

The study, published in the U.S. journal Environmental Health Perspectives, showed that even small amounts of the chemicals made the algae on coral susceptible to viral infection. The killing, or bleaching, of the algae - which have a symbiotic relationship with the coral - is a death knell for the whole structure.

"Once the coral bleaches, it can't really survive," said Christian Daughton, chief of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's environmental chemistry branch at the National Exposure Research Laboratory in Las Vegas.

Dermatologist's sunscreen advice

Editor - As a dermatologist, I read the July 10 article "Burning questions raised over sunsceens' effectiveness" with great interest.

There is no question that the frequent use of effective sunscreens, in combination with sunprotective clothing and sunglasses, lessens the risk of skin cancer and premature photoaging.

Sunblocks that contain zinc oxide and titanium dioxide effectively block UVA and UVB by reflecting them. However the other category of sunscreens, chemical sunscreens, offer only UVB and at most partial UVA protection.

Chemical sunscreens chemically bind to the skin and may release free radicals. In addition, some chemical sunscreens break down upon exposure to sunlight.

There is a difference, and readers can find the sunscreens on the label listed under active ingredients.

DR. ANYA LANDECK

San Rafael

Don't Try This At Home...

NEW YORK (AP) — A 12-year-old girl just wanted to show her cousin the view from her family's Manhattan rooftop. Instead, she fell into a chimney and plummeted down the flue for 14 stories, emerging nearly unscathed to tell her story after landing in a pile of furnace soot.

Grace Bergere, a young rock drummer, was recovering at a hospital on Saturday with an injured hip. A 2-foot-deep pile of ash and dust probably saved her life by cushioning her fall when she crashed into a basement furnace, fire officials said.


"I broke my leg! I broke my leg!" she yelled out after rescuers spotted her soot-caked hand reaching out for help.

Fire Chief Austin Horan said the 12-year-old emerged "relatively unscathed" from the accident Thursday night at the Westbeth Artists Housing complex in the West Village neighborhood. The complex houses artists, including Grace's father, Steve Berger, a jazz guitarist.

"It's a miracle; it's an absolute miracle," he said.

Firefighters responding to a 911 call never expected to find the girl alive. While her father screamed her name, they opened a little metal door at the bottom of the chimney, ready for the worst.

When Grace's small hand poked out, "I just jumped back," Lt. Simon Ressner told reporters on Friday. "I wasn't expecting anybody alive at the bottom of the shaft, so I was shocked."

When they pulled her out, Grace was covered with black, only her eyes and mouth visible.

The rooftop adventure started at about 10:30 p.m., when Grace decided to show her cousin visiting from California the spectacular view from a rooftop deck overlooking the Hudson River.

To get to the highest point, she climbed up a 25-foot ladder alongside the big brick chimney. When she reached the top, there was a surprise: the gaping mouth of the chimney, which swallowed her and sent her plunging down the narrow flue into the basement.

"I think she probably went down head first and landed on her back," Ressner said.

Grace was recovering at Manhattan's Bellevue Hospital Center on Saturday, talking to visitors and watching TV, but still in pain. She was in fair condition.

Lollipop and Maria Maria

Hello this is Hannah,
I have been to both maria maria and lollipop. Lollipop is awesome I reccomend the Cookies and cream icecream!!!!!!!! don't get the beans and rice thing the beans are super spicy!!!!!!!!

Sooo ya bye

marai maria and lollipop

Hey Everybody,

I have gone to lollipop everyday since it opened it is great i love the ice cream they make it there right in the place. Its so cool. They have the best assortment of candys. I think the laffy taffy is so cool they have like blueberry and watermelon flavers. I have never had a cup cake but i heard they are really good they also make those right in there. Also i have beeen to Maria Maria it was good but the only thing is my burotio had corn in it but it was still delious. they have a lot of stuff there i think next time i will get a quesedilla .

Well Thank you for reading my post!!!!

-Jackie O'Boyle