| Sealing house can enhance air quality, inhibit mold growth
Dear Jim: My children have allergies to mold. I want to make my house more airtight for better energy efficiency, but I heard this can exacerbate mold problems. What safe efficiency improvements can I make? - Karla S.
Dear Karla: People often think airtight, musty, mold-ridden indoor air quality is the price one has to pay for greater energy efficiency. Actually, making your house more energy efficient can positively affect air quality.First test your house for mold. Several laboratories offer home mold test kits. For a "viable" test, you grow your house test samples in a petri dish. At IMS Laboratory, it costs only about $10 for the kit. If you find mold growth, they charge about $35 more to analyze the mold types. Some types of mold cause few problems, while others are quite toxic.A better test is "nonviable" test, where the sample is analyzed for many types of mold.
Clinton's Chances Jeopardized After S.C.
After the election, the campaign circulated a blog post on The Left Coaster noting that Obama had "actually underperformed on the white vote (significantly) ... in South Carolina compared to Nevada." The message of this post seemed to be that as a result of his reliance on black voters in South Carolina, Obama would continue to underperform among whites.
This analysis is questionable. Nevada's whites voted in a caucus, not a primary. They were likely to be more liberal than their South Carolina counterparts and to belong to unions. But the general point could be correct. By painting Obama as the black candidate, Hillary Clinton might have lost the African-American vote but won the nomination. On February 5, it will be important to look at the Latino vote in California, New Mexico, Arizona, New York, and New Jersey, and the white vote in states like Tennessee, Arkansas, and Missouri, where Obama's overwhelming support among blacks may not be sufficient to carry the state.
Antigenics Reports Fourth Quarter and Year-End 2007 Financial Results
For the three months ended December 31, 2007, the company incurred a net loss attributable to common stockholders of $7.7 million, or $0.16 per share, basic and diluted, compared with a net loss attributable to common stockholders of $11.7 million, or $0.26 per share, basic and diluted, for the same period in 2006. For the year ended December 31, 2007, Antigenics incurred a net loss attributable to common stockholders of $37.6 million, or $0.81 per share, basic and diluted, compared with a net loss attributable to common stockholders of $52.7 million, or $1.15 per share, basic and diluted, for the same period in 2006. The company's net cash burn (cash used in operating activities plus capital expenditures, debt repayments and dividend payments) for the year ended December 31, 2007 was $27.5 million, which represented a reduction of approximately 45% from the net cash burn of $50.1 million for the year ended December 31, 2006.
Exploring Turkishness
The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction is given yearly to an American fiction writer. The 2006 award went to an author who spent quite a bit of time as a journalist in the Middle East, based in Cairo. Geraldine Brooks wrote Nine Parts of Desire, a book of non-fiction, which tells the stories of women around the Middle East and Foreign Correspondence detailing her experiences searching for her childhood pen pals around the world. A versatile writer, Brooks has since switched her focus from journalism to historically based fiction. She was awarded the Pulitzer for her novel March, which is set in the Civil War-era United States. March is about an army chaplain, whose character is based on the absent father in Louisa May Alcott's Little Women. After leaving his family to do what he feels will be the right thing, fighting the good fight against the Confederacy, the idealistic character March becomes severely shaken and the moral dilemmas he faces begin to affect his ideals and his marriage.
Willows schools face gloomy budget forecast
WILLOWS — As the state budget crisis gathers over Glenn County, officials at Willows Unified School District are preparing for the worst. "The worse-case scenario is that we are going to have to cut $1 million from the budget," said Steve Olmos, WUSD superintendent, at a meeting this week of the board of trustees. At a meeting Thursday night, the board of trustees learned proposed state budget cuts could cost the district hundreds of thousands. New business director Steve Rudy presented the gloomy outlook from the state, saying the district could lose up to $650,000 in Cost of Living Adjustment reductions. But it isn't just state cuts that will affect the district. Rudy said federal revenue of $200,000 may also be eliminated. How much of a cut Willows Unified will have to make will depend on what happens in Sacramento.
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