Jamie knew he was a “different” kid when he cried at the end of a tv movie at age 8 or 9.

AP Newsbreak: New medical marijuana policy issued

By DEVLIN BARRETT (AP) – 14 hours ago

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration will not seek to arrest medical marijuana users and suppliers as long as they conform to state laws, under new policy guidelines to be sent to federal prosecutors Monday.

Two Justice Department officials described the new policy to The Associated Press, saying prosecutors will be told it is not a good use of their time to arrest people who use or provide medical marijuana in strict compliance with state laws.

The new policy is a significant departure from the Bush administration, which insisted it would continue to enforce federal anti-pot laws regardless of state codes.

Fourteen states allow some use of marijuana for medical purposes: Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington.

California is unique among those for the presence of dispensaries — businesses that sell marijuana and even advertise their services.

Attorney General Eric Holder said in March that he wanted federal law enforcement officials to pursue those who violate both federal and state law, but it has not been clear how that goal would be put into practice.

A 3-page memo spelling out the policy is expected to be sent Monday to federal prosecutors in the 14 states, and also to top officials at the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Administration.

The memo, the officials said, emphasizes that prosecutors have wide discretion in choosing which cases to pursue, and says it is not a good use of federal manpower to prosecute those who are without a doubt in compliance with state law.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the legal guidance before it is issued.

At the same time, the officials said, the government will still prosecute those who use medical marijuana as a cover for other illegal activity. The memo particularly warns that some suspects may hide old-fashioned drug dealing or other crimes behind a medical marijuana business.

In particular, the memo urges prosecutors to pursue marijuana cases which involve violence, the illegal use of firearms, selling pot to minors, money laundering or other crimes.

And while the policy memo describes a change in priorities away from prosecuting medical marijuana cases, it does not rule out the possibility that the federal government could still prosecute someone whose activities are allowed under state law.

The memo, officials said, is designed to give a sense of prosecutorial priorities to U.S. Attorneys in the states that allow medical marijuana. It notes that pot sales in the United States are the largest source of money for violent Mexican drug cartels, but adds that federal law enforcement agencies have limited resources.

Medical marijuana advocates have been anxious to see exactly how the administration would implement candidate Barack Obama’s repeated promises to change the policy in situations in which state laws allow the use of medical marijuana.

Shortly after Obama took office, DEA agents raided four dispensaries in Los Angeles, prompting confusion about the government’s plans.

On the Net:

• Drug Enforcement Administration: http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/

Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

(image courtesy of Flickr user Temari 09, licensed under the Creative Commons)

For awhile now, my alma mater, MIT, has been building a sizable collection of course information dubbed OpenCourseWare. The collection was in its infancy while I was at MIT and some professors were skeptical of making their entire lesson plans and course materials available publicly. After all, they’re being paid to train MIT students and offer something unique or different from what what is offered elsewhere. So if all of their materials were available, what’s to stop another school or professor from claiming to offer the same education as MIT? Okay, so I don’t know of any professors who truly espoused that opinion, but it’s certainly a concern. Nevertheless, the prevailing wisdom seems to instead focus on how this information can increase access to information and help professors at various institutions refine their courses, become better teachers and ultimately raise the tide, so to speak.

Some 5+ years later, and there are over 1,900 (!!) courses with information available in the MIT OCW catalog. And MIT isn’t the only place that does this. In fact, there’s an entire OpenCourseWare Consortium with universities from around the world offering content.  Harvard, Princeton, Stanford*, Yale, and a number of other high caliber schools also offer lectures online, for free**.   now one can even find video lectures for certain courses (perhaps this further erodes some of the mystique or advantage offered by MIT but I would contend that the mere presentation of information, without the interactive community and overall experience, isn’t what sets MIT and its graduates apart). I’m amazed by the wealth of information that is available! I wasn’t a computer science major, but now I can go back and get the course information that I missed out on while there. I can explore areas that interest me now that were somewhere on the other side of the world when I was actually taking and choosing classes.

What a fabulous resource! And now, many of the video lectures from MIT (and a lot of other schools) are available on iTunes under the iTunes U section, where you can subscribe to entire courses, browse by subject or institution and get your complete fix of learning in your home or on the go. Another option is to explore Academic Earth, which opened earlier this year and aggregates a lot of the course and lecture information from across a number of institutions (a brief look at the computer science section, page 1, shows courses from Harvard, Stanford, MIT, and UC Berkeley).

Me? I’m picking up some knowledge about computer programming…

(image courtesy of Flickr user Wesley Fryer, licensed under the Creative Commons)

*I’m a little disappointed that the Stanford materials are only accessible through iTunes. While I admit that the iTunes U offerings are quite nice and offer a level of convenience in finding this information, I hate the idea of being locked into a particular piece of software or vendor in order to access content that could easily be played on a number of different platforms & devices.

**Some of the institutions offer solely the lectures, others offer course materials as well, and there are a number of models somewhere in between.

Parisian style … Alex Virag behind the wheel of his Citroen 2CV. Photo: Richard Jinman

Richard Jinman discovers the city of love from an antique Citroen.

Alex Virag says the mere sight of a Citroen 2CV is enough to make many Parisians smile, and he’s right. Driving down a narrow street in our curvy, cream-coloured convertible with bright red seats, we pass a middle-aged woman on a bicycle. The car makes her do something unusual for a grown-up Parisian: she giggles like a lovestruck schoolgirl. “Ah, ma jeunesse!” she exclaims.

Virag, my 26-year-old guide, turns to me from the driver’s seat. “It was her first car – her youth,” he explains seriously. He toots the 2CV’s horn, a sound resembling a frog with laryngitis. “You are still young, madam!” he shouts in flirty, heavily accented English. The woman blushes and waves madly, her bike charting an increasingly wobbly course down the street.

The 2CV, for the uninitiated, is France’s answer to the Austin Mini or the Volkswagen Beetle. It was designed in the 1930s by Pierre-Jules Boulanger to a utilitarian brief: a vehicle capable of transporting two people and 100 kilograms of farm goods at 60km/h across muddy and unpaved roads if necessary. The result might have been a Gallic brick. Instead, it was a curvaceous, deceptively simple car with Bauhaus-inspired bodywork and a canvas-sunroof. Its name referenced its modest horsepower rating – deux chevaux vapeur means “two steam horses” – and it quickly became an icon.

Between 1948 and 1990, Citroen built more than 3.8 million 2CVs. They were once ubiquitous in France and popular in Britain – the 1980s star Lloyd Cole wrote a song about a girl who drove one – because of their low cost and eccentric retro style. But times change. The cars have become something of a rarity in Paris and well-maintained vehicles command increasingly high prices among aficionados.

One of several companies offering 2CV tours around the French capital is 4 Roues Sous 1 Parapluie – a name that plays on the 2CV’s nickname “the umbrella on wheels”. You can choose your route from the company’s menu or make up your own. Virag, who collects me from my hotel near the Arc de Triomphe, suggests we mix it up. The Friday traffic will pose certain “probleems” he says, but we will see familiar landmarks and parts of Paris only Parisians know well.

I lower myself into the car – an immaculate 1977 model – and onto a seat with the consistency of an overstuffed sofa. Virag fires up the engine and we pull out into heavy Champs-Elysees traffic propelled by what sounds like an overwrought sewing machine. Cobblestones shake the car and I grip the rudimentary seat belt even tighter.

My driver wears a jaunty cap, a shirt with the collar turned up and what looks suspiciously like a cravat. It’s an ’80s boy-band look that could get you killed in certain Australian hotels but worn behind the wheel of a 2CV on the Champs-Elysees, it makes perfect sense. As modern Citroens and Peugeots dart around us, Virag explains, rather unnecessarily, that one needs to be “cool and patient” to drive an antique car in the Parisian rush hour.

“Drivers here are rude, angry and fast,” he observes as a BMW flashes past my door. “But they drive well – much better than in Toulouse.”

We swing left, off the Champs-Elysees onto ritzy Rue du Faubourg Saint Honore. The 2CV corners like a 600-kilogram blamanche but it’s not an unpleasant sensation once you get used to it. Virag points out the Elysee Palace, home to Nicolas Sarkozy and his third wife, Carla Bruni. There’s Cartier, here’s Hermes. It’s a clear day, the car’s roof is wide open. It’s wonderful looking up at the sky and the passing streetscape.

Driving a rudimentary convertible has its downsides, of course. “Sometimes when it rains you have water at your feet,” says my guide cheerfully. “You go splish, splash. But it’s OK.”

A business and tourism graduate, Virag proves an amiable companion. I marvel at his ability to swerve around pedestrians while pointing out the finer details of the Place Vendome or the Pompidou Centre (“a lot of people hate zis building”) in his second language. Tugging and twisting the gear stick – a lever topped with a billiard ball that protrudes from the dashboard – he navigates easily through the city’s backstreets.

Virag offers his views on Bertrand Delanoe, Paris’s openly gay mayor. “E is socialist but very popular,” he says. “E ‘as done a lot for Paris.”

Delanoe’s achievements include the furious washing of public monuments. Notre Dame, for example, gleams like ivory.

But away from the tourist hotspots, the quieter streets of the fashionable Marais district and the Latin Quarter retain the patina of grime that gives Paris its urbane edge.

In one of these streets – Rue de Verneuil – we find a pop culture shrine: the house once occupied by Serge Gainsbourg and his English partner and muse, Jane Birkin. It’s hard to miss. Thousands of fans have covered the walls with tributes to France’s great singer, songwriter and libertine who died of a heart attack in 1991 and whose funeral brought Paris to a standstill.

The traffic is thickening now. After forcing our way through a line of gridlocked cars on the Boulevard Saint-Germain – “that was crazy,” admits Virag – we decide to call it a day. In less than three hours, we have driven through much of central Paris and found time for a couple of stops.

Virag pulls up to the kerb outside my hotel. We shake hands and say goodbye.

Just before he drives away he glances at the mirror, adjusts his cap and tugs his collar to the required angle. This is Paris, after all, and standards must be maintained.

Richard Jinman travelled courtesy of Etihad Airways and Rail Europe.

FAST FACTS

Getting there

Etihad flies to Paris via Abu Dhabi for about $1850 (low-season return from Melbourne and Sydney, including tax.) The author travelled from London to Paris on the Eurostar, taking about 2 hours, from €68 ($110) one-way.

Driving there

4 Roues sous 1 Parapluie has a fleet of cars and a range of tours to suit your budget, time and familiarity with Paris, or will create a bespoke itinerary. For a quick hit, the 30-minute Paris to Champs-Elysees tour takes in tourist hot spots such as the Arc de Triomphe, the Eiffel Tower and Les Invalides, from €19 a person with three people in the car to €58 if you’re alone. See 4roues-sous-1parapluie.com.

Ahh, I love these cars!!

(Image from Flickr user stuartpilbrow)

I have tried just about everything for managing finances. Mint, Yodlee, Wesabe, Quicken Online, Quicken installed on my computer, MoneyDance…and I’m sure a host of other personal finance managers. And I keep coming back to Microsoft Money. Which, much to my chagrin, has been discontinued.

You see, I have a long love affair with Microsoft Money and used it for years, in part because somehow it was on my computer I didn’t have to pay for it. I’m sure some kind manufacturer placed it there and who knows what happened for it to be activated. I truly am not sure. Nevertheless, I became comfortable with it, though I wasn’t above switching (hence the fact that I tried all of those other potential solutions).

In the end, what keeps bringing me back is the ability to chart a cash flow forecast. Not just a spreadsheet of sorts with a bunch of numbers but a graph of the money flowing in and out of my account. The line on the graph goes higher, I have more money. Thel ine goes lower, approaches zero, I can see that I might overdraw an account 3 months down the road because of some irregular expense. NONE of the other potential solutions match this feature in MS Money. In fact, none of them even come CLOSE to the functionality offered by MS in this regard. Which makes me sad because it seems like such an intuitive thing to include.

(image from Amazon’s product page: see the nice graph in the lower left corner showing the cash flow for the next few months?)

(image from Microsoft Money Help & Information Pages)

And yes, I realize that the other options offer other forms of functionality that MS Money doesn’t (namely, the online syncing that actually works with my bank account, credit cards, etc.) I actually have kept my account at Yodlee for this very reason – they sync with EVERYTHING. EVERY.SINGLE.ONE of my financial accounts can be linked in Yodlee, which is a feat in and of itself, but it also makes it convenient to get the data I need to put in MS Money (which I hunted down a couple of months ago on an auction site to grab the last version since stores had already nixed it).

So, MS Money – something I will hold onto until I absolutely can’t anymore (or until a solution comes along that matches this one particular feature that is a deal-breaker for me). I will keep a computer with Windows XP or Vista on it, if necessary just to maintain my access to the cash flow forecast that MS Money provides.

By Jason Fitzpatrick, 12:00 PM on Sun Oct 4 2009, 11,764 views (Edit, to draft, Slurp)

Organizing things that have a permanent home isn’t that difficult. Assign a space and be disciplined about returning the item. What about transient, outgoing items like library books, loaners from friends, and so on? Create a station for them.

The items themselves aren’t permanent, in fact they’ll all be on their way soon enough to the library, the video store, or the donation bin at the local thrift store soon enough. In the mean time however, you’ll be able to keep a much tidier home if these homeless items aren’t roaming free.

At design and organization blog The Red Chair, they advocate creating a permanent station for your transient items. Their solution is to use some basic wire storage cubes and cardboard banker’s boxes which keeps the total cost of their station at around $25. You may opt to go for a more elegant solution for your home or to stash your station in the hall closet out of sight.

If you have a similar station already, we’d love to hear about it in the comments.

DIY Storage For “Transient” Items [via Unclutterer]

Ahh, I’ve been trying to de-clutter our house a bit, and DEFINITELY need something like this for day-to-day use. I think the bigger thing that tends to get us are the items that don’t really require ACTION per se, but need to be filed, scanned, or something similar.

We have been trying to move toward a more digital repository of documents and such, with frequent backups since bills and other information is included, but that doesn’t stop the deluge of paper-based crap that comes in the mail, and some companies are still in the ice-age and don’t have a good way to pay online/get bills online. So, those bills come in and once they’re paid, there’s still the task of scanning and filing in our electronic filing cabinet. Tedious, and not at ALL what I want to do on any given afternoon or weekend.

Sooo, while this is a great idea, and may help clear up some of the clutter, it’s probably not going to get the biggest source of clutter taken care of, unfortunately

Lately I have felt the need to get WAY more organized and reduce clutter. This has meant truly moving to more digital filekeeping and a need to get rid of a LOT of stuff. I don’t want to ever feel like stuff is holding me back from reaching my goals or fully utilizing my talents. For me, that has meant re-examining what sticks around & what goes. The magazines definitely go (on the flip side, paper & pen to do list stays – more on my adventures in project/task management & organization soon).

What have you gotten rid of that you once held onto? What stays even if it doesn’t make sense to others?

We had a bunch of nearly overripe bananas hanging around so it seemed like a perfect time to make banana bread! I was a bit uncertain about how this would come out because I made a few substitutions even from the modified recipe I was following. It is quite good, though, and a bit more airy than traditional banana bread, which I liked. I think the next time I’ll look for some ways to add a bit of protein in so that it’s a good breakfast bread that will give some sustained energy through the day.

Ingredients

• 3 large eggs
• 4 medium bananas, mashed
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup Splenda
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 3/4 cup all purpose flour
• 3/4 cup King Arthur organic whole wheat flour (or other wheat flour)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400F and spray bread pan with Pam or other nonstick cooking spray
2. Beat eggs, sugars, and Splenda together, then add vanilla extract and mashed bananas
3. Combine flours, baking soda and salt in large bowl, and then add liquid mixture. Stir by hand just until mixed.
4. Pour batter into bread pan and bake until a toothpick in the center comes out clean (it took about 28-30 minutes in my oven)

A good trick for even-more-fabulous banana bread? Make it the night before you want to eat it. When it’s done in the oven, remove, let cool and then wrap in saran wrap overnight before eating. For some reason, the overnight in saran wrap seems to add a little something!

Anyway, my first thought was the trusty old stalwart: Amazon. And then I realized I would rather support an individual or maybe just a smaller company. I went searching for some eco-friendly options without much luck but then headed over to Etsy for some homemade goodness.

There are a LOT of people selling on Etsy. Many times, it’s difficult to distinguish who you should purchase from. I often will use their search options to find someone more local but there’s not always someone with what I want.  Last night’s tactic relied on the visuals. And the seller that ultimately got my business? She not only had multiple pictures of the product that weren’t underexposed or otherwise unattractive, but she had some with her adorable long-haired chihuahua. And Bagels, the chihuahua, happens to look very similar to Smidgen, my papillon (aside from coloring), and so I was hooked.

Two leashes purchased because I connected with the seller through her images. In a world where a lot of connections are made online or electronically, it’s important to find ways to connect with your buyers, clients, etc. Lots of people can do the same thing, and you may not even be able to differentiate your skills. So how do you connect on a more emotional level that will bring in more customers?

Oh, and here are a few of her pictures. Please check her out on Etsy!

Images are copyright BoogieGear on Etsy!