October 2009 Archives

Bet you don't think about getting all your day's fat in one sitting when you're scarfing down that tasty treat. Take a quiz to find out how much you know about making smart food choices.

Photos by Flickr members Bruce Tuten, kali.ma, jspace3, emborg, adwriter, and Hienrock. Used under the Creative Commons license.

For over a year now there has been a moratorium on issuing new permits for fast-food restaurants in an area of South Central LA. Some see it as just one step government can take in combating an epidemic of obesity. Others say even if government could make us eat better, banning fast-food restaurants is not the solution. Plus, they're a long, and vibrant part of LA eating - food trucks. And humorist Brian Unger says life is scary enough - who needs Halloween?

More

CHEAT! CHEAT! The answer is here.

SoCal Connected introduces a little diversion to test your neighborhood knowledge - Name That Spot.

Here are some visual details from a specific site somewhere in Southern California. It might be a city block, a park, or a civic institution. Your assignment, should you choose to accept it, is to study the material and try to guess the location.

OK. Can you Name That Spot?

CHEAT! CHEAT! The answer is here.

If you have a location to suggest for Name That Spot, use our contact form to send us your guess. .

More

Watch Name That Spot #1

Watch this short video for the answer toName That Spot #1.

OK. Maybe it was a bit too obscure. But at least one viewer got it. Elliot Fujisaki sent in the correct location:

The 4600 block of Hollywood Blvd.

More

Mary Donkersloot is a Registered Dietician with a private practice in Beverly Hills. She specializes in child nutrition and eating disorders.

Feeding kids is an important job for parents. Taking the easy way out and opting for processed, packaged or fast foods can often mean too much sugar, fat, salt, which generally means too many calories. In some cases, this kind of eating leads to devastating results, including overweight kids. On the other hand, it can be daunting to plan balanced, family meals that are appealing to kids and not too time consuming.

As a mom and a nutritionist, I strive for family meals with protein, whole grains, fruit and vegetables, but eating white bread and watching TV happens, even at my house. I remind myself that perfection is not the goal. It’s less about rigid rules and more about guidelines. Call it a lifestyle. Here are ten tips for trim kids:

1. Delineate the role of the parent and the child. The parent decides what the child will eat, the time and the place. From the menu the parent provides, the child decides what and how much he or she will eat. This will avoid struggles and allow the child to regulate their own food intake, as it should be. If a child seems to want to eat too much, make sure they consume vegetables and milk before giving seconds of the starch. (Kids don’t usually want seconds of the protein). For overweight kids, serve both a cooked and a raw vegetable.

2. Give meals a sense of occasion. Set a nice table, take time to chat over dinner. Parents should eat meals with their kids as often as possible. Kids want to be like grown-ups and they can learn about a variety of foods, normal portion sizes, setting limits and balancing nutrients from observing what parents choose to serve and what parents actually eat. Parents should avoid talk about dieting with kids. Instead, be a positive role model.

3. Expose kids to a wide variety of foods as soon as they start eating solids. If they see parents eating a variety, they’ll want it too. Dinners should include fish at least two or three times a week, chicken two or three times a week, and lean meant once or twice. Vary starches to include rice, pasta, and potatoes (mashed, roasted, boiled with butter, hash browns or home made French fries).

4. Let kids participate in food preparation. They can peel potatoes and carrots, pour the oatmeal in the boiling water, stir the soup, husk the corn, wash the salad greens, and set the table. Helping out is great for self-esteem and helps to expand the connection with food in a positive way. Clean up is a lot easier if kids do their share. Start these behaviors as early as pre-school, so kids are used to it as they grow up.

5. Limit processed foods. Kids who are used to chicken nuggets that are infused with sugar, oils, and flavorings are not as likely to go for home -cooked chicken breasts. Meanwhile, the nuggets are higher in fat and calories, setting kids up for a palate with expectations that don’t appreciate fresh, real food like peas, corn, green beans, fish, chicken and lean meat.

6. Make sure kids are hungry at meal times. Kids who have continual and unlimited access to juice and goldfish crackers will be too full from snacks and consequently less eager to try new foods at dinner. Snacks should be mini-meals, a little protein, a little carbohydrate, and a little fat. Let kids drink water or milk with snacks. Here are some snack ideas: apple or banana with peanut butter or almond butter, cheese stick with grapes, bread with peanut butter, dry cheerios and a glass of milk, blueberries with yogurt or pudding.

7. Limit juice, lemonade and other sugared drinks to 4 to 6 ounces per day, or avoid altogether for overweight children. Avoid apple juice altogether if you can. Because of its sweetness, kids get hooked on it and their palate may not longer want milk or water. Juice between meals can make a child too full so they are not hungry at mealtime. Eliminate all soft drinks.

8. Serve a fruit or vegetable each time you feed your child. For example, serve a fruit with breakfast and snacks, and a vegetable with lunch and dinner. Sneak fruits into milkshakes or smoothies and add vegetables to soups and sandwiches.

9. Desserts are best after a meal. There’s no reason to cut out desserts completely, but it is reasonable to allow them after a meal and not before. Choose desserts that are not ultra-rich, like a small amount of regular (not premium) ice cream with bananas or chocolate, or oatmeal cookies with milk, or strawberries dipped in chocolate or popsicles.

10. Limit dining out to once a week. When you make trips to fast food restaurants, which should be infrequently, once or twice a month or less, tell kids you’ll only go there if they agree to certain rules. Order small or regular-sized sandwiches instead of whopping double-super-sized. Order milk instead of soda. Let them eat fries, even though they are not ideal. Just make it a treat and not a regular occurrence.

Feature image photo by Flickr user Emborg. Used under the Creative Commons license

Congratulations! The recession is unofficially over.

Still, there are foreclosures on almost every block. Unemployment is at historic highs. The budget deficit is ballooning and the planet is warming. Do we really need a scary holiday, when EVERYDAY is scary enough? Humorist Brian Unger ponders Halloween, during the Great Recession.

More

SoCal Connected anchor Val Zavala takes us on a mobile dining adventure, inside the food trucks that remain a vibrant part of the LA food scene. From the ubiquitous taco wagons, to the upscale restaurants on wheels, and all the specialty food vans in between, these migrating eateries are an important part of the local economy. And, she says, technology now makes finding them easy.

More

For the past year, there's been a moratorium on new fast-food restaurants over a wide swath of South Central LA. Proponents say it's a way of improving the diet for the population, in an area with too few healthy food choices. Others think government has no business trying to legislate good eating habits. Correspondent Angie Crouch takes a hard look at food and politics in Los Angeles.

More

This week we're featuring stories about food. The politics of food, and the joy of eating at food trucks.

Southern California has been a crockpot of innovation when it comes to how and what we eat. Scroll through a few of our culinary contributions:

While young people generally enjoy good health, some get sick with serious or life-threatening illnesses. Yet a huge number of young Americans either can't get health insurance, can't afford it, or just don't think it's worth the cost. Correspondent Lisa Ling reports on how that's endangering not just individuals, but the entire health care system.

More

Los Angeles now has more medical marijuana clinics than it can count. These pot clubs are already pseudo-legal at best, and some of them appear to be getting around a city ordinance designed to stop their proliferation.

Correspondent Judy Muller hits the streets to find some of these clinics and drills city council members on why they have had so much trouble enforcing a moratorium on new dispensaries.

More

In times past, people were a lot more circumspect when it came to talking about disease. Most professionals think it's a health trend - we're far more open than we once were when it comes to illness. But laughing about having cancer? Correspondent Vince Gonzales says some serious giggles might be just what the doctor ordered.

More

Over four million pot plants destroyed, this season alone. Squads of law enforcement officials spend each fall eradicating plants from thousands of illegal pot farms. The cops say most are operated by Mexican cartels. They figure it's easier to grow the weed here then it is to try and smuggle it across the border.

Finding the pot farms is the easy part - they can be fairly easily spotted from the air. But getting to them is where it gets tough. Many are in very rugged, remote areas.

Correspondent John Larson went on a search and destroy mission with a group of elite officers we call the Cannabis Cowboys.

More

Two-thirds of all American bankruptcy cases involve medical bills. Grandma has Medicare, but her grand-children may be uninsured. And even if you have insurance, you often have to fight tooth and nail to get your provider to pay for your care. Commentator Patt Morrison recently had surgery, and now, more than ever, she's wondering why we all know the health care delivery system is deeply ill, yet we are so resistant to finding a cure.

More

Commentator Marcos Villatoro encouraged his son to come up with some creative ways to raise money for a school trip to Washington, DC. Little did he know his son would soon be the most popular dealer at his junior high.

More

Jovan Rodriguez had no insurance and no savings when he was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma.

He's one of the young people referred to by some as the Young Invincibles—those who fall in the 19-29 age bracket and make up the largest group of uninsured in the country—and he appears in our segment on the Young and Uninsured.

And he created a video documentary of his treatment, hoping to leave some kind of record in case it didn't go so well. This video is a condensed version of video taken during his last day of chemotherapy, and it's not for the queasy.

Links
• Visit Jovan's MySpace page

Photo: Brian Frank

This dispensary was denied a hardship exemption by the city council, yet continues to operate.

More

They seem to be popping up all over town - marijuana clinics.

Some are pretty low-key. You could drive by them every day and not notice. Others are more blatant about what they are selling. And in some places, like along the Venice boardwalk, barkers work the crowds, trying to steer people into storefronts, promising that "The doctor is in", and offering a no-wait prescription.

Here's a little visual taste of the cannabis clinics of the City of the Angels.

Veronica Cruz is a former CNN correspondent.
My brother, Eric, died on July 4, 2009, while awaiting a heart transplant. Five years ago, he was diagnosed with severe dilated cardiomyopathy, a weakening of the heart that prevents it from pumping normally. Since then, we had tried to get Eric coverage that would allow him to get the treatment he needed, but no private insurer would offer him insurance because of this preexisting condition.

My brother and I grew up in Northern California and, though we were a couple years apart, we were very close.

As kids, we spent our time together at the local ice rink. Eric played hockey; I trained as a figure skater.

As adults, we remained best friends, talking and joking on the phone every day. He was a talented artist, music producer, and designer. Most of all, my brother made me see that there is more to life than work.

When Eric’s heart condition was diagnosed, our lives changed forever. This past May, his kidneys began to fail and doctors told me only a heart transplant would save his life. Since he was young and otherwise healthy, I thought our chances were excellent.

But Eric did not have the luxury of insurance coverage provided through his employer. His only insurer, state Medicaid, wouldn’t cover the out-of-state operation Eric needed. He was denied federal Medicare - twice.

Eventually, when we finally did get federal coverage for Eric, the hospital still demanded private supplemental insurance to help cover the huge expenses. Private companies wouldn’t insure Eric because of his preexisting condition. We were told we might still have to come up with nearly a million dollars.

Medical bills have bankrupted our family. My mother even shared her own heart medication with Eric when he couldn’t afford it. With Eric’s health deteriorating, and feeling desperate, I began relying on the kindness of strangers.

In May, I started talking about Eric on social media network Twitter. To my amazement, relying on kindness worked. Within a week, hundreds of donors had raised $6,000 and Eric’s cause was being promoted by celebrities like Demi Moore and P. Diddy. Supporters soon numbered in the thousands. Popular bands Nine Inch Nails and Jane’s Addiction, as well as professional skateboarder Tony Hawk, helped put fundraising into overdrive. Altogether, “Eric’s Twitter Army” raised nearly $1 million in a matter of weeks.

In June, Eric was moved to a California hospital, where he was put at the top of an organ transplant list. We were planning for the future, looking forward to doing normal things together, like walking his dog and skating. And every day, I took time to assure my brother that everything was going to be okay.

But it was already too late. Before Eric could receive a transplant, he passed away. That day, I promised to do two things: to take care of my brother’s dog, Chance, and to help other transplant patients like him. I told Eric that I’d do everything I could so that no one else would ever have to suffer as he did.

Still mourning my brother, I‘ve been trying to fulfill those promises. In August, I flew to Washington, D.C. to lobby Congress for health care reform, arguing that coverage must be available all, even to those with preexisting conditions, and that insurance companies be prohibited from dropping sick patients.

At private meetings with lawmakers, I detailed every painful step of Eric’s battle. It was emotionally draining, but I wanted every single member of Congress to hear his story. I’m also starting a foundation to raise more funds to help others in Eric’s situation, and my mission is to mobilize as many people as possible to help prevent other tragedies like his from happening.

My brother’s inability to get adequate health insurance has had a devastating impact on my life and the lives of Eric’s family and friends. Being excluded from the health care system because of a preexisting condition robbed Eric of his fair chance at life, and it robbed all of us of his gifts, talents and love. Health care reform may come too late for Eric, but I hope it will come in time to help thousands of other families who may otherwise also lose loved ones simply because private insurance companies refuse cover those with preexisting conditions, leaving them with no other options. Helping make the day that everyone has the right to health insurance a reality will be Eric’s greatest gift.

Comedian Robert Schimmel was diagnosed with Stage III non-Hodgkin's lymphoma in 2000. So what's a funny man to do but make jokes about it?

Last year Schimmel published a book, "Cancer on $5 a Day," exploring how humor helped him through his fight with the disease. Listen to him read an excerpt about sharing his love of laughs with his chemo support group.

The LA City Attorney has submitted a new, tough draft ordinance designed to regulate LA's growing legion of medical marijuana clinics. Were it to pass as written, it would be among the state's toughest ordinances governing cannabis clubs.

KCET has obtained a copy of the draft ordinance. It proposes to ban over-the-counter sales of pot, only allowing clinics, organized as collectives, to recoup expenses from their members. And it contains this language, regarding who can actually obtain cannabis from a collective:

No collective may provide medical marijuana to any persons other than its members who participate in the collective cultivation of marijuana at or upon the property of the collective.

The draft regulations redefine the application process, establish a series of application and inspection fees, set limitations on the hours the clinics can operate, and bans any pot shop operating within 1000 feet of schools, churches, child care facilities, hospitals or other marijuana collectives.

Finally, the draft plan requires any marijuana clinic that doesn't comply with the new regulations to cease operations immediately. It provides an exception for the some 180 clinics that registered prior to September, 2007, when the City passed it's Interim Control Ordinance, placing a moratorium on new applications.

"We're going to ban sales," Councilman Dennis Zine told the LA Times. "The profit margin is what's gotten them going. They're not in there to help people, they're in there to make money."

The Times reports that some Council members want to take up the draft ordinance within the next week. Earlier this week, a Superior Court judge ruled that the Council violated the law when it extended the moratorium on new applications for a third time earlier this year.

Almost 40% of the nation's uninsured are between the ages of 18-35. They're taking personal risks, and putting the entire health care system in danger. Plus, coping with a serious illness, by laughing about it. And Patt Morrison confesses how she had to bargain for health care - all the way to the operating room.

More

Americans between the ages of 18-35 make up the largest group of those without health insurance.

They're the subject of the top story we're working on this week, as SoCal Connected looks at the legions of the young and uninsured.

Great numbers of young people graduating from college and moving into the workforce are losing the health insurance they got through their parents or their school, and not replacing it.

In many cases, that's because employers don't offer insurance. Or, young workers often choose to opt out of employer-sponsored plans because they perceive them as being too expensive.

Many young people think of themselves as healthy, and unlikely to require much in the way of medical attention. But consider these facts:

• Young adults, particularly young males ages 16 to 24, are at the highest risk of all ages for traumatic brain injuries. (Confronting Traumatic Brain Injury, Yale Univ. Press, 1999)
• One-third of all HIV diagnoses are made among young adults. (American Demographics, Feb. 1999)
• Almost one-quarter of 18-29 year-olds are obese. (Commonwealth Fund study, April, 2009)
• There are 3.5 million pregnancies each year among the 21 million women ages 19 to 29. (Commonwealth Fund study, April, 2009)

Photo: Rick Wilkinson

Correspondent John Larson

Red's Ranch
I was standing in the middle of a bright, green marijuana farm, a patch worth about 19 million dollars, when I learned pot farmers might be ripping off Red Skelton. Not the famous comedian himself, because Red died a while ago, but his widow. She owns a nearby ranch. Pot farmers need water, I was told, a lot of water.

The Hunt for Water
We were in an illegal marijuana "grove" near Hemet, in an wilderness area know for illegal marijuana farms. Law enforcement busted several near here last year. Today they were had found four more. We had flow in with CAMP - The Campaign Against Marijuana Planting - the largest law enforcement task force in the United States.

Mark Reynolds, a Riverside County Sheriff's Investigator, came up to us in the grove and said he was going to try to find the water source. Marijuana needs up to gallon per day per plant in hot, dry climates. Almost all of it is stolen from natural springs, water mains, fire lines, private homes or ranches.

When a marijuana farmer want to start a farm, he first looks for water.

According to Reynolds, "Around mid-November they'll come out and start looking. The theory behind that is if there is water flowing in late November there is going to be water through out the year."

Then the growers will assemble their team, usually illegal immigrants from Mexico, brought in to prepare the land. Often the workers are under duress, their families threatened or frightened back in Mexico.

"We've actually arrested people that have told us straight up that they were brought up from (Mexico) specifically to tend marijuana, and we hear... how they were forced to come up, their families are being threatened and pressured," says Chris Jackson, the Regional Commander of CAMP.

The growers buy miles of rubber hose, tubing and drip lines - from big box stores like Home Depot. They carry it into the grow sites, often miles off the faintest trail, deep in the wilderness. They tap into a water source and then begin siphoning the water, sucking it through the hose with their mouths as they bury the line. They can run the line for miles, up over hills and down into canyons, burying it the entire way.

Photo: Rick Wilkinson

CAMP Regional Commander Chris Jackson, with Larson

" Its amazing how resourceful they are and how good they are at tapping into springs and then building reservoirs," says Chris Jackson, the Regional Commander of CAMP.

"They do it all without pumps, and get garden hose strength from two miles away."

Reynolds follows the rubber hose, pulling on it with his hands, ripping it out of dense scrub. It is rough going.

After an hour, he follows it into a large bush immediately adjacent to the Skelton Ranch.

He finds the pot farmers have installed different plumbing here, changing from rubber hose to buried a buried PVC pipe.

The pipe leads 30 yards onto the Skelton Ranch and taps directly into the ranch's well.

A Poisoned Well
"They did a sloppy job. You can see there's no back valve", says Reynolds as he digs down, exposing where the pot farmers cut in the ranch's water line.

The absence of a back valve means the pot famer's pesticides and chemicals may have backwashed downhill through the lines, and poisoned the drinking water in the well. All of which leads the investigator to believe the ranch owner knew nothing of pot farmer's theft of her water.

Small environmental disasters are increasingly common on marijuana farms. The growers use Mexican pesticides, illegal in the United States. The pesticides pollute ground water and kill wildlife.

Dave Sickels, and officer with California Department of Fish and Game says "We find dead rats, mice, and small animals all over the marijuana farms. They've been poisoned, and of course other animals have then eaten them, too"

And all the toxins go into the water table, along with fecal matter left by the growers. The clean-up comes out of taxpayers pocket's. It costs at least 10 thousand dollars per acre to clean up and haul out the toxic chemicals, rubber hose, and trash - over a hundred million dollars this season alone.

Reynolds finds the ranch caretaker, who explains Skelton's widow has been gone for five weeks. But, he has seen men in the bushes from which we just came. He tells us he saw men with bicycles early in the year and later, men with guns. He thought they might be hunters.

No Harvest No Pay
Reynolds explains usually several farmers will sit with the plants, living in rough camps for up to six months, fertilizing and watering the marijuana. At harvest time, they hire more workers, usually for about 200 dollars a day.

"We've seen up to six to ten to twelve subjects up there during harvest time. They clip the plants, they cut the plants they trim them they'll hang and dry them," says Reynolds.

The farmers usually get paid only when the crop is sold. Meaning: today's farmers are out of luck. In fact, on this day the CAMP team eradicates 4 marijuana farms, worth an estimated $60 million.

Camp's Chris Jackson says, "Not only are they out a paycheck, but this comes out of...the street dealers pocket... out of the middle man, and it goes way up to the drug cartels down in Mexico. So all the violence and interactions than you see with the cartels down there, this is taking money straight out of their pockets."

A Superior Court judge has ruled the city's ban on medical marijuana dispensaries is invalid in a case that could make it difficult for the city to move against other pot clinics, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Dispensary Green Oasis sued the city last month, claiming the moratorium on new clinics was unconstitutionally vague. Today, Judge James C. Chalfant granted a preliminary injunction preventing the city from enforcing its own ordinance and said the council acted outside state law by extending the moratorium.

The injunction applies only to Green Oasis, but the outcome could be seen as favorable to other marijuana dispensaries across the city, which might try to follow suit.

RELATED STORY: Feds, Local Cops Do Marijuan Do-Si-Do

So you think it's impossible to outsource our streets? Take a look at these manhole covers. One from Mexico. Another from India, proudly displayed under the "City of Los Angeles."

If you spot any covers from other countries DO snap a photo and send it to us. We'll start a gallery and call it the "Small small world of manhole covers."

OK—everybody sing to the tune of "It's a Small World." Ready?

It's a world of pavement.
A world of tar.
It's a place where manholes come from afar.
So our jobs disappear
Cause we don't make them here.
It's a manhole after all.

Hey. I think I heard someone harmonizing.

Dan Glickman says he's stepping head of the MPAA. This is perhaps the most sought-after lobbyist's job in the country. Maybe the world. You get to hang out with celebrities, and socialize with the Washington elite.

Now seeking Chairman and CEO of the Motion Picture Association of America.

The successful candidate will:

• Have impeccable connections with members of Congress
• Have impeccable connections with Hollywood moguls
• Have the ability to extract billions in tax breaks for the entertainment industry
• Enjoy traveling on a private jet
• Help us forget how great Jack Valenti was
• Be able to survive on a salary of less than $1.5 million

No resumes or phone calls, please. We'll contact you.

It's official. The Justice Department issued a memo this morning advising federal prosecutors not to go after medical marijuana dispensaries that are operating in accordance with the legal guidelines of their respective states.

You can read the memo here.

"It will not be a priority to use federal resources to prosecute patients with serious illnesses or their caregivers who are complying with state laws on medical marijuana, but we will not tolerate drug traffickers who hide behind claims of compliance with state law to mask activities that are clearly illegal," Attorney General Eric Holder said in a statement.

So the announcement indicates federal authorities will not turn a blind eye to shady entrepreneurs trying to get a free ride on the marijuana bandwagon. Nor does it appear have any bearing on LA County District Attorney Steve Cooley's pledge last week to crack down on illegal pot clinics. It simply suggests the feds may be trading places with local authorities. LA County law enforcement agencies have tended to be tolerant of dispensaries. Now it appears they may be leading the crackdowns, while the feds back off.

More

More

TMZ/SplashNewsOnline.com

The Crime
Maria Shriver has been caught three times. On camera. Talking on her handset. While driving. The shame. The horror.

The Investigator
The celebrity Web mag TMZ first published a couple of still shots of the Terminatress jawboning on her hand-held yesterday. Then they followed it up with a short, extremely low-quality video.

The Response
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, via Twitter, promises "swift action" in response to the violations.

TMZ, perhaps influenced by SoCal Connected's reporting on the topic of distracted drivers, has pulled out all the stops on this story, and is expected to demand Shriver's resignation and encourage the Legislature to meet in special session and pass a measure banning her from the state.

Catch TMZ's team coverage on this important, fast-breaking story here.

SociaLiteLife.celebuzz.com

But There's More
If you love this story, you can thank your lucky stars you live in the Internet Age.

So, if you''re already bored with pictures of people who look vaguely like Maria Shriver engaging in illicit telecommunications, may we recommend:

SociaLiteLife's comprehensive collection of Celebrities on Cellphones.

This week on SoCal Connected we're reporting on the explosion in the number of medical marijuana dispensaries in the area. Here's a few items and facts about Los Angeles pot clinics:

Bay Area vs SoCal
Who has the best restaurants, baseball teams, lifestyle and art museums? Now add pot shops to the rivalry between LA and the Bay. Depending on your point of view, LA is either miles ahead, or quickly sinking into the abyss.

California NORML maintains a list of medical marijuana dispensaries. It's not all-inclusive, but it is a fairly comprehensive list of places that provide pot. The site lists about two dozen dispensaries in the bay area - about 20 in San Francisco, four in Oakland and only two in Berkeley.

For the LA area, the list runs to more than 250 establishments.

Other Socal Locations
A number of area municipalities have successfully either banned clinics, or have placed moratoriums on new ones. San Bernadino, Redlands and Yucaipi have laws banning dispensaries. Loma Linda, Yucca Valley and Montcliar have moratoriums in place. West Hollywood's ordinance limits the number of pot shops to four, and Palm Springs will only allow two.

The Rest of the World's Watching
Australia's Brisbane Times been picking up some of the stories written by the LA Time's John Hoeffel on the clinics. He and others, including The Washington Post have reported that the Mexican cartels that control most of the marijuana trade (and finance many of the illicit pot groves inside the US) are taking notice of the legal marijuana business, and may see it as a threat.

The BBC recently reported on medical marijuana, focused on Oakland, and posited that California was moving toward legalization of pot.

And Australian reporter Henri Paget, of NineMSN News, showed his viewers down under just how easy it is to score in Los Angeles. He got a prescription, then took his camera into an LA pot shop to make a purchase.

Residents in the foothills above the Los Angeles National Forest whose homes survived the fire last month are now girding for possible mudslides. A big Pacific storm is moving toward Southern California. The rainfall might help green things up and mitigate the drought, but it will almost certainly cause slides in some fire areas.

Some residents have spent thousands of dollars preparing berms, fences and other blockades they hope will keep the mud and debris from flowing into their houses. And some say they'll evacuate rather than chance being overcome by a lava of mud.

Scientists from the US Geological Survey have been sampling the soil across the 160,000 acres that were burned. They say heat and gas from the fire permeates the soil. That's formed what they describe as a waxy layer, just below the surface. That waxy layer can prevent water from soaking into the ground. Instead, it rolls down slopes, carrying mud, rock, trees and other debris along with it.

Residents near fire-burned areas can get advice and updates at a Web site established by LA County's Coordinated Agency Recovery Effort. There's also a special telephone number: 800-214-4020.

If you have pictures of the preparation going on before the storm, or of its aftermath, we invite you to share them, by posting your images to the SoCal Connected Flickr stream.

A Timeline of Mobile Devices

The United States has seen an almost exponential increase in mobile phone use since the devices first went commercial in 1983, and today there are more than 229 million wireless subscribers, according to data from the Federal Communications Commission and CTIA: The Wireless Association. Yet anyone out of college can remember keeping a stash of quarters in the car for that emergency mini-mart payphone call (or, better yet, calling collect).

The shift in communications patterns didn’t exactly happen overnight. Texting, long popular in Europe and Asia, didn’t become fashionable here until well into this decade. The total number of cell phones didn’t overtake traditional wired telephone or "land" lines until sometime in 2004. Yet some experts are predicting that text messaging could soon be replaced by instant messaging services—the Yahoo! Messengers and the Google Talks with their graphical emoticons and lack of usage fees—as they become more accessible on handheld devices.

Change is coming fast, and it seems ever more the case that the only reliable constant for this generation or the next is change itself.

So just how fast is fast? Take a look at this visual timeline to see some of the historic moments in the history of mobile communications, and watch as wireless devices overtake their tethered counterparts. Then keep reading below for some interesting factoids.

More

The LA County District Attorney, Steve Cooley says virtually every marijuana clinic in the county is breaking the law, and he's vowed to prosecute them.

Cooley told reporters that it's his opinion that under California law, it is legal to cultivate marijuana, but not to sell it over-the-counter or distribute it.

Voters passed an initiative in 1996 that allowed patients to grow small amounts of marijuana for medicinal use. In 2004, the State Legislature passed the 2004 Medical Marijuana Program Act, which allowed patients to "collectively or cooperatively to cultivate marijuana for medical purposes." It also allowed a "primary caregiver" to provide marijuana for a patient.

Most of the pot clinics (or their lawyers anyway) organized under the idea that they were primary caregivers. But last year, the state Supreme Court ruled that a primary caregiver must be actively involved in providing care for an individual, beyond simply selling or supplying them with marijuana.

So the strategy changed. Now the marijuana clinics claimed to be collectives, made up of patients requiring marijuana.

Cooley believes most of these "collectives" are simply for-profit-businesses, and not collectives at all. He says that in the main, the clinics do not enlist the members of the collective in cultivation, and that the law does not sanction over-the-counter sales of marijuana.

The state Attorney General, Jerry Brown, issued guidelines after the 2004 law was passed. They specify that the collectives must operate as non-profits, but do allow them to collect fees from members to recoup expenses.

Should the DA's legal strategy prevail in the courts, his office will face a daunting task prosecuting all the operators of pot clinics in LA County. There are no reliable numbers on how many pot shops are operating in the county, but some estimates say more than 800 marijuana dispensaries are open in the city of LA alone.

We've all seen people talking on their handsets while driving, even though it's been against the law in California for more than a year.

The CHP has issued more than 110,000 citations to violators since the cell phone law went into effect in July of 2008. The law allows the use of a hands-free device, but makes it a violation to talk directly into the handset. Another law, banning texting, went into effect at the beginning of this year.

To get a handle on how many people are still chatting away on their handsets, my colleague Brian Frank joined me on the sidewalk for a brief, and only vaguely scientific experiment. We spent a half-hour observing cars at the corner where Hollywood and Sunset converge with Hillhurst.

We stationed ourselves on opposite sides of Sunset. Then, we counted ALL the cars that passed by for a period of two minutes. We multiplied that number by fifteen to arrive at an estimate of how many cars would go by in a half hour.

Traffic Estimate

116 cars (in two minutes) * 15 = 1740 cars per half hour

Then we began our half-hour observation. We tried to count everyone we could see talking on a handset, dialing or texting, or talking on a hands-free device.

We counted a total of 46 drivers using mobile devices. Here's the breakdown.

• Talking On Handset - - 25
• Talking on Headset - - 13
• Dialing or Texting - - - - 8

So, are our results surprising? Maybe. Maybe not. In our brief count, less we spotted less than 3% of all drivers using a phone. But two-thirds of the folks we did spot using phones were doing so illegally - either texting, dialing or talking directly into the handset.

We spotted two tow truck drivers talking on their handsets, and one guy working an iPhone in an AT&T van. And a lot of additional distracted driver behavior. There were people smoking cigarettes and talking on their handheld. There were drivers who were eating, drinking coffee or putting on make-up. And we almost certainly missed some drivers who may have been talking or texting; it's tough to get a visual bead on everyone going by, and if there was any doubt about whether are driver was actually using their phone, we didn't count them.

How does all this square up with your experience? Do you often see folks violating the cell phone laws? Got any pictures? If so, let us know in a comment, or send us a note at socalconnected@kcet.org.

There is a consensus building that our penchant for talking and texting while driving has become a major safety hazard.

More

We've become a nation of over-communicators, a culture that is excessively accessible. Brian Unger's prescription for our hyperconnectivity syndrome: a collective time-out.

Studies show more than 80% of drivers say they talk on the phone while behind the wheel. But as Correspondent Angie Crouch tells us, just because you are following the law, and using a hands-free device, doesn't mean you're any less distracted.

Here's a dilemma. You've been at a party. You need a ride home. One friend offers, but you can tell she's had too much to drink. Another is known to do a lot of texting while driving.

Either way, you're in trouble. But as correspondent Vince Gonzales found out, the texter could be just as dangerous, or even more so, than the drunk.

We teamed up with Car and Driver magazine to find out just how dangerous it can be to text while driving. Tune in tonight at 8 PDT to watch the segment.

Hands-free cell phone devices offer no advantage over hand-held devices.

That's the conclusion of survey of studies conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, first published in 2002.

"...there are negligible differences in safety relevant behavior and perfomrance between using hand-held and hands-free communications devices while driving from the standpoint of cognitive distration."

Specifically, the study found "degradations in driver behavior" and "changes in risk-taking" in drivers using cell phones. It concluded this occured among cell phone-using drivers whether they were talking hands-free or not.

The report, which is more than 250 pages long, looked at scores of reports and scientific studies in drawing its conclusions.

But NHTSA withheld the report, and killed a proposal to follow it up with it's own long-term study. This was at a time when many states were outlawing the use of handhelds by drivers, but allowing hands-free devices. Critics say the NHTSA was fearful of alienating members of Congress who'd directed the agency to stick to collecting safety data and not lobby for changes in state traffic laws.

This summer, two consumer groups obtained the report through the Freedom of Information Act, and passed the document along to The New York Times, which published a story about it in July.

Here's a PDF version of the entire document.

You may have read about Utah's tough new law against texting while driving. It specifies long prison sentences - of up to ten years - for texting drivers who cause fatal accidents.

But the state is also leading the way with an education program called Zero Fatalities. Launched by the Utah Department of Public Safety, it's goal is to change the perception that traffic fatalities are inevitable, and the result of "accidents." In fact, the program points out, most traffic "accidents" are actually the willful act of a driver who has allowed themselves to become distracted. The distraction could be anger or alcohol or lack of sleep. Or it could be texting.

Zero Fatalities produced this powerful video about the impact of one texting-while-driving accident.

The Utah program has already caught the attention of other states. Arizona is developing its own Zero Fatalities program, and Utah officials hope their idea will serve as a model for safe driving programs nationwide.

For more information, visit the Zero Fatalities Web site.

Technology may be killing us. There seems to be no doubt that the mixture of cell phones and driving is dangerous. And texting while driving appears to be the most dangerous mobile activity of all.

Various studies show anywhere between half and three-quarters of teen drivers admit they often text while driving. Other studies show huge support for banning such activity, including a recent CBS News/New York Times poll.

So can technology help prevent what technology hath wrought? Some entrepreneurs think so, and they hope to convince parents, if not teens, that they have systems that can keep a kids hands on the wheel, and off the keypad.

Some, like a system from Aegis Mobility, use GPS to detect if a phone is moving at driving speed. It simply intercepts calls and texts if it detects movement. Aegis has a dramatic - maybe over-dramatic - presentation of its system online. It charges a monthly fee, and is trying to set up deals with insurance companies to give young drivers who employ the system a break on their rates.

But GPS-based schemes have obvious downsides. They may block phones when users are in cabs, riding with others, or maybe, even while skateboarding (that might not be a bad thing.)

Others take a different approach. Safe Driving Systems, of Salt Lake City, uses bluetooth and an electronic key that determines when a car is running. The bluetooth sends out a signal that locks the keypad during driving. The company hasn't yet brought the product to market, but expects it to be available soon, for a one-time fee of about $100.

There are firms developing monitors that can alert parents when their children are sending texts on their phone while driving - often by sending a text to the parents phone. (Hope the old folks aren't driving when they get that alert.)

As you may have noticed, high technology sometimes totally misses the irony in its pursuits. So, there are also systems that attempt to translate text messages to voice, and allow users to respond by voice, which is then translated back to text. Wouldn't it just be easier to actually use the phone, and talk in it?

So far the big cell phone carriers have not announced any major initiatives to limit or restrict calls and texts in automobiles, though one could see the marketing advantages of such a service, especially since so many parents are footing the bill for their kid's cell phones.

Many experts think at the end of the day, it will take years, and a massive amount of education and enforcement to wean drivers from the distraction of their mobile devices. Parents may have to do the unthinkable - pry the phones from their children's texting fingers. And kids who've gotten the message may have to become enforcers, too - shaming Mommy and Daddy when they reach for the phone while they're behind the wheel.

Images from flickr.com members poka0059, Colin Purrington and bsimser. Used under Creative Commons license.

So it's 6:00 on Friday and I realize I am the Grand Marshall of the Latino Heritage Parade in Pasadena the next morning -- and yikes!

I don't have a single thing to wear!

My father was from Mexico and my Spanish is conversational, but my closet is full of Talbot's.

I beeline it down to Olvera Street and for $29 -- voila! A Oaxacan blouse, sash and fake flower and I am Senorita Zavala.

The car I'm riding is, by the way, is a 1973 French something-or-other that has been in enough movies for a SAG card.

What kind of Grand Marshall would I be if I didn't throw candy to the kids. Add $20 for that and the total comes to $49. I also got $20 in cash but I realized later I forgot to get it from the cashier. Damn. Have you ever done that? I won't add that in.

The funny part was when adults actually would yell, "Hey -- over here! Over here!"

I don't know if anyone actually knew who I was, but what the heck. Tuve un gran tiempo! And what a bargain.

In an upcoming episode, we are looking at the young and uninsured. People like Edward E-Nunu. He's a graduate student, pursuing a Master's degree in Education at Claremont Graduate University. He's also a diabetic. Edward attended Etiwanda High in San Bernardino County. He went on to graduate from UC Riverside. Here's his story:

In 1996 I was diagnosed with Juvenile, Type I Diabetes. My diagnosis came after I began experiencing different diabetic symptoms like frequent urination and excessive thirst. Following my diagnosis, I was fortunate enough to be insured under my parents. Under their insurance, my prescription needs for a glucometer and chemstrips to monitor my daily blood sugar records, as well as syringes and vials of insulin came with little cost or difficulty. For years I went without worry as I became involved in high school athletics and extra-curriculars for college. Visits to the doctor became a challenge as I attended school away from home. But when I graduated from college in 2006 my health situation changed dramatically.

Upon graduation, my coverage under my parents was dropped and left me with few options. Filling an existing prescription for insulin went from being a trouble-free and inexpensive task to being very problematic and pricey. Diabetes, as is the situation for other prescription-dependent illnesses and diseases, forced me to find a way to get my insulin on my own. Pharmacy visits to Rite-Aid seemed useless without an insurance card to help with retail prescription costs. Purchasing insulin affected not only my livelihood, but also my pocketbook.

My mom suggested I look into a county health program for low-income individuals in the San Bernardino area. Through this program, I was only able to get my prescriptions filled after visiting the emergency room or scheduling an appointment with a local physician. Unfortunately, these emergency room visits lasted at least 6-8 hours - just to get a prescription. It took additional time to get the prescription filled the county pharmacy. Even worse, the appointments scheduled with local physicians often required me to wait months for an urgently needed prescription.

As a result, I had no choice but to occasionally pay for high-priced pharmaceuticals or suffer the “health” consequences. Being an uninsured diabetic put me at a complete disadvantage if I were to ever become sick or injured. I injured my fingers in a recreational football game and was forced to visit the emergency room. What appeared to be a routine check-in on my fingers at the County Hospital resulted in a three-day hospital stay for an infection and an elevated blood sugar reading.

Despite being uninsured, my participation in this county program has been beneficial to my health. This may offer a solution to other individuals in this same situation. Searching for county hospitals that provide medical assistance to the uninsured seems to be the most cost effective means of obtaining treatment and needed medication.