I’ve been thinking about this tragedy all day and ask you to set aside politics again for a moment. Contemporary Christian singer/songwriter Steven Curtis Chapman’s five-year-old adopted daughter, Maria Sue, died Wednesday when her teen-age brother accidentally ran over her as he backed the family’s car out of their driveway. Chapman’s music and life have been inspired by, and centered on, faith and family. His oldest daughter, Emily, encouraged Chapman and his wife to adopt after having three of their own natural-born children; the couple adopted three beautiful girls from China. They performed missionary work in Chinese orphanages and established a charity named after their first adopted daughter, Shoahannah. At the time the accident occurred, the family “was celebrating the engagement of the oldest daughter Emily Chapman, and were just hours away from a graduation party marking Caleb Chapman’s completion of high school. Now, they are preparing to bury a child who blew out 5 candles on a birthday cake less than 10 days ago.” Maria Sue had just graduated from church preschool.

"The sands of time are running out...in the end what matters is getting aid through to people and feeding them and stopping them from dying,"

New outbreaks in China reported Wednesday put the number of children infected with hand, foot and mouth disease above 15,000 and the death toll has risen to at least 28 across the country.

...So far, 15,799 outbreaks of the disease have been reported throughout the country this year, Xinhua said.

At least 28 children in China so far have died from the disease. Most of the deaths have been blamed on enterovirus 71, one of several viruses that cause the disease, Xinhua said. EV-71 can result in a more serious form of hand, foot and mouth that can lead to paralysis, brain swelling or death.

Although nearly all the deaths have been blamed on the virus known as EV-71, it was not immediately clear how many of the overall infections were traced to it. Xinhua said in Yunnan only nine of the 113 cases were caused by EV-71.

The hardest-hit areas include the provinces of Anhui, Guangdong, Zhejiang, and the capital Beijing. There have been smaller outbreaks in Hebei, Jiangsu, Hunan, Hubei, Shaanxi, Jiangxi and Henan provinces and in the city of Chongqing.

On April 29 alone, five people in separate incidents across the country took their own lives by inhaling a lethal dose of hydrogen sulfide. That brought the April total to 59 self-inflicted deaths resulting from the gas, which is easily created by mixing various detergents.

Online, hydrogen sulfide has earned a reputation for providing a quick and painless death, but those who have to deal with the aftermath say it's anything but the case.

"When hydrogen sulfide enters the bloodstream, it mixes with hemoglobin and turns the blood green. All the skin goes blotchy, and the body looks repulsive," a police insider tells Nikkan Gendai. "And, if by chance the victim survives the suicide attempt, inhaling the gas for even a short time ensures they're going to have massive, irreparable brain damage."

Hydrogen sulfide deaths don't only affect those who choose their demise in that manner. When a 14-year-old schoolgirl in Kochi Prefecture ended her life that way in April, fumes seeped out from the bathroom where she took her own life and left another 14 people, including her mother, requiring hospitalization. In another case in Takamatsu, mass evacuations were needed.

2/16/2008
The Rocky Mountain Interventional Endoscopy 2008 course finally concluded at noon today. I went home exhausted and slept for two hours while Alice took the kids out.

After my nap, Alice and I talked to each of the kids about my cancer diagnosis. We started with our oldest Joshua (16 yrs), then our two younger children Caleb (10 yrs) and Nikki (5 yrs). Given their age gaps each one needed a different approach.

Each one of our children had committed their lived to Christ at a very young age so we were able to discuss the news of cancer in a spiritual context, and to pray with them.

We told them that we did not yet know God’s will regarding daddy’s cancer, but that we believed that God could heal me, either through medicines or miraculously. At the same time I told them that I am prepared to go if God should decide to take me home at any time.

We assured them of God’s love and total commitment to their welfare.

Each child received the news with remarkable calm and asked a few questions. Alice and I were amazed at their response and wondered if the news had sunk in. We decided to wait and see what would happen in the next few days.

Nevertheless as parents we found the experience emotionally gut wrenching. I found myself wanting to physically embrace each of my kids again and again, as though it could be my last chance to hold them in my arms.

As someone who peruses the society page of a couple of different magazines here in town, I've got a bit of a pet peeve. You have a guy that is dressed nicely, at a high class function, stone cold munchin', and standing next to an attractive woman who's a date/spouse/person whom he'd like to impress enough into one or the other, and he's got a beer bottle in his hand.

Man pushes creation of panel to prepare city for space aliens

Jeff Peckman is back at it, and this time he is bringing little green men along for the ride.

The Denver man, who sponsored an offbeat ballot initiative that would have required the city to implement stress-reduction techniques, now wants to ask voters to create a commission dealing with space aliens.

"It is important because if you're driving down the highway and you saw a crash of a small spaceship and a car or a bus full of kids, you really wouldn't know what to do," Peckman said Thursday. "Do you wait for the hazardous materials experts to show up because of potential contaminants from another solar system? What do you do? People really don't know."

Peckman, 54, who is single and lives with his parents, has submitted to the city a draft of the proposed ordinance, which would require the creation of an Extraterrestrial Affairs Commission.

As required, the city is holding a "review and comment" meeting on the proposed ballot initiative with Peckman on Thursday.

"I don't know what we're going to ask him yet," said David Broadwell, an assistant city attorney.