Frank — I always said that their are three things that hold a marriage together — Love - Laughter and Communication. I don’t know what I would do if I didn’t have those three ingredients in my marriage. I know you miss your Annie but it’s obvious that her spirit lives on in you. Take care — I love your posts.

There was a recent uproar (maybe a dust-up) in a little community North of Berkeley with regard to a merchant who contracted with T-Mobile to put one of their satellites on the roof of his business. This is a very small community and everyone gets to have a say when something “new” is proposed in the community. And the proposed satellite was “new”. Many residents were afraid and others were simply concerned. Hardly anyone liked the idea of a possible cancer causing menace being installed in their midst. The merchant just recently said he has cancelled the contract with T-Mobile because “it just wasn’t worth the back-and-forth arguments”. It would seem that Satellites are becoming part of the old invocation, “Not in my backyard”.

My husband gives me a hard time about hanging onto our landline - but I do prefer to talk that way than on a cell when I am at home! And it’s there in emergencies, too.

I avoid phones like the plague. Don’t answer them; calls go to voicemail. Everyone knows to email me if they need to get in touch with me. As far as I am concerned, phones today have made it far too each to contact someone with an inane question that could easily have been answered had the caller given it a little thought or planning. Been to the supermarket lately. I guess no one makes lists anymore; the caller just calls home and gets the kids to go through the cupboards to see what they need while Mom’s in the store. Silly. As far as phones and brain tumors…….ho hum.

For me, i refuse to use my cell phone unless i’m in an emergency situation. I hate the thing! As for the link between cells and tumors, it is possible, since some types of music can cause a seizure.

I’m very grateful that nobody much calls me.

I have no idea whether there is any validity to the studies correlating the incidences of brain tumors with cell phone usage, but I hope not. Because if they are shown to be valid we are going to have a whole lot of very sick young people in this country.

Since we are on the subject of the relationship of cell phones and brain tumors ponder on this a while and watch your fingers. I don’t know how to text message with my cell phone, nor do I want to. Last March, 2007, I had to have a Keratoacanthoma Squamous Cell Carcinoma removed from the first knuckle of my pinky finger on my left hand. It even required a skin graft to replace the skin covering the knuckle. Since I am right handed I don’t think it happened as a result of using my cell phone, but - waves passing through my right ear, through my skull and brain, down my neck to my shoulder, and then down my left arm until it reached its final destination of pinky finger first knuckle. Hmmmmmm…If this is what really happened then keep an eye open for a strange wart with a horn growing out of it on all those texting fingers out there that will be vunerable to getting this unusual type of skin cancer from their mobile devices. Of course I am being sarcastic about the evils of mobile communication devices. But, I did have that kind of skin cancer. My point is that if we want to spend time being paranoid about all the things that can be tied to causing cancer then we may as well all just stop breathing. Being cautious and prudent with this living experiment they call our ‘body’ is one thing, but we can’t stop functioning in the world…for what? So we can live forever?

the sad thing too is the 1996 Telecommunications Act does not allow municipalities to regulate towers for public health concerns so even though we know this is bad for us, we aren’t allowed to say no to them in rural areas where we hadn’t had a market for towers until now - court cases have upheld the Act -

Cellular phones utilize a type of low energy electromagnetic radiation—microwaves. This type of elecromagnetic radiation is “non-ionizing” radiation. Gamma ray, x-rays, and some high energy UV waves are “ionizing radiation”, which means they can knock electrons from atoms, thus ionizing the atoms. It is these types of electromagnetic radiation—the high energy EM waves—that can cause cancer, since they can disrupt DNA molecules by ionizing atoms on the DNA molecules, causing subsequent “mistakes” in replication that if not repaired, can lead to cancer. Microwaves do not have enough energy to do this. They actually have less energy than visible light, which is also a form of electromagnetic radiation, and we know that exposure to a light bulb does not cause cancer.

Ladies, I know these are important issues, but I have a hard time reading about more cancer, so not reading, but have to say - USE a headset. I use one in car, and one at home. It is easier.