katie allison granju

A survey released last week by a national allergy… March 21, 2004

A survey released last week by a national allergy & asthma specialists’ association named the city in which I live, Knoxville, TN, as being the worst place in the country for people with asthma. We have very poor air quality here, due to numerous coal burning energy plants, high auto emissions, and other factors. So it’s a bad place for folks who suffer from asthma, and people who live here are at higher risk for developing asthma.

This story was on the front page of the local newspaper, the lead story on the local TV news, etc

But as usual, no mention was made of the fact that exclusive breastfeeding (meaning only mother’s milk for at least six months) significantly lower’s a child’s risk for developing asthma.

I’ve talked to a number of people in the past week who have kids with asthma or “pre-asthma” type symptoms, like wheezing, etc. The topic of this new survey comes up and these folks go on and on about how the air quality here is so bad for asthmatics, etc, etc

Not a one seems to have ever been told by their pediatrician or anyone else that formula feeding increased their kids’ likelihood for getting this dangerous disorder. If I ever-so-gingerly mention it (aware, as I am that discussing one’s infant feeding choice is as touchy as talking about religion or politics), they generally dismiss it out of hand ( a la the ubiquitous, “you can make those studies say just about anything”).

So here’s my question: why is it ok to make me - a mother who chooses to subject her kids to the dirty air here in east Tennessee “feel guilty” about her choice of locale by releasing this study, but NOT ok to make women who choose not to breastfeed “feel guilty” by telling them that infant formula raises their kids’ risks for asthma?

WANTED: HOUSE I’m looking for a house to buy an…

WANTED: HOUSE

I’m looking for a house to buy and here are my criteria:

-under 150K

-within 15 minutes of downtown knoxville in any direction

-at least 3 bedrooms and at least 1700 sq feet

-hardwood floors

-actual laundry room as opposed to laundry closet

-up to date roof, HVAC, and wiring

-nice neighbors

-small or very low maintenance lot

Neighborhoods I’m most interested in are Island Home, Fountain City, 4th and Gill, Old North, and Druid Hills

If you know of such a house that will be for sale in the next few months, email me at: katieallisongranju–at–yahoodotcom

My Dad won $100,000 last week for his client who w… March 20, 2004

My Dad won $100,000 last week for his client who was served industrial cleaning solution in a cup at a fast food restaurant. It was an interesting case. The guy’s health is actually totally ruined, so the verdict wasn’t that big.

I tend to avoid big discount stores because it see… March 14, 2004

I tend to avoid big discount stores because it seems like whenever I’m there, I see and hear parents being cruel to their children.

Yesterday I had a really terrible experience at Target. I was shopping by myself and from several aisles away I could hear a little kid crying as her mother kept telling her to “shut up,” and then following up by telling her that if she didn’t stop crying, she was going to “whup” her. It was awful.

Feeling powerless, I started to leave that area of the store but in doing so, I happened to walk right by their aisle just as the woman proceeded to belt her kid in the head three times.

I literally gasped out loud. It was totally involuntary. I stopped dead and said very loudly, “What in the world do you think you’re doing hitting her like that?!”

She looked shocked and told me to mind my own business - that she was just disciplining her. I told her that hitting someone in the head over and over isn’t “discipline.”

By this time two other people had stopped their carts and were listening to the exchange. And although they had not seen what the woman had done and didn’t know her or me from Adam, they both piped up and told me that I should butt out.

“Good for her, making her child behave,” opined one of the two women. “I’ll bet your kids are little brats!”

(I am not making this up)

Then the other woman chimed in with basically the same comment.

I told the woman who had hit her daughter that I was going to go get security, which I did. I told them what I had seen and that they needed to call the police. They refused. So I asked what they would do if I told them that I had just seen a man hit his wife in the head several times while shopping in their store. They told me they would immediately take the man to the security office until the cops arrived.

So I called 911 and told them that there was a woman in the store walloping her kid in the head. They told me that this was a “private family matter,” and nothing they could or would look into.

:::sigh:::

I’ve heard the argument that you should reach out a hand of compassion to people you see abusing their kids in stores, but honestly, I just couldn’t do or say anything but what I did. And now maybe in some small way that little girl has had the seed planted that she doesn’t deserve to be treated that way, no matter who it is that’s doing the hitting.

Martha Stewart made the same mistake Richard Nixon… March 6, 2004

Martha Stewart made the same mistake Richard Nixon made: lying about what she did has gotten her into far more trouble than what she was lying about ever would have on its own.

And she is a living example of how karma works. Her alleged nastiness toward a wide variety of people throughout her adult life has come back to bite her. If she didn’t have a longstanding reputation as a mean, nasty person, I think things would have gone much better for her.

But her lawyer seems like a complete incompetent. Why didn’t he tell her that wearing expensive fur wraps to court (like she did the day she was convicted) just wouldn’t strike the right tone?

Having said all of this, I think that sending her to prison would be wrong, very wrong. She should get probation and a hefty fine (of course she has already lost millions and millions of dollars because of this). She should also be barred from sitting on the board or being on the payroll of any publicly traded company forevermore. But sending a 65 year old woman with no criminal record to prison for something like this would be excessively cruel and pointless.

I started my new job this week as a new media prod…

I started my new job this week as a new media producer with the top-rated TV station in our area. So far, so good. I like it a lot.