TODAY IS TUESDAY - APRIL 7, 2009

The Morning Show
on Spirit FM
with
JIM & KAREN


LIFE CHANGING WORD

When the king smiles, there is life; his favor refreshes like a spring rain. Proverbs 16:15

The beauty of spring flowers I dependent on spring showers! As their roots thaw and soak up moisture, the plants come alive; the rains are their source of life.

Like the spring flowers, our lives need rainy days for recharging. Rainy days sometimes spoil our plans, but they can help us slow down and reconnect with God, ourselves and others.

On gloomy rainy days be intentional. Call a friend and go out for lunch. Read a book or just enjoy some quiet time. Listen to the music of the rain. Smell the freshness that comes over the earth and allow the refreshement to soak into your soul!

Allow each rainy day in your life to recharge your soul and make your life bloom more brightly and beautifully.


TODAY IS…..

Today is No Housework Day, no bed-making, no dishes, no trash, no guilt, sponsored by the Wellness Permission League of Lebanon, Pennsylvania. In other words, a day like any other day at our house.

Today is National Coffee Cake and Caramel Popcorn Day.

Today is World Health Day, marking creation of the UN's World Health Organization on this date in 1948. Of course, Karen would make a great poster child for World Health Day don’t ya’ think? "Hey it’s hard to be fit as a fiddle when your rear end is the size of a cello."

This is Families Laughing Through Stories Week, time to tell funny family stories.
1860: Will Kellogg was born in Battle Creek, Michigan. Will's physician brother John developed corn flakes and other cereals to serve to patients at his mental hospital, and Will founded the Kellogg company to market the cereals.

1902: The Texas Fuel Company was founded just outside Beaumont, Texas. Later it became known as Texaco, now owned by Shell.

1952: "I Love Lucy" became the #1 TV show with an episode entitled, "The Marriage License."



IN THE NEWS:

HOW TO FIX THE ECONOMY IN A HURRY
Dear Mr. President,
There are about 40 million people over 50 in the work force - Pay them $1 million apiece severance with the following stipulations:
1. They retire immediately. Forty million job openings - Unemployment fixed.
2. They buy NEW American cars. Forty million cars ordered - Auto Industry fixed.
3. They either buy a house or pay off their mortgage - Housing Crisis fixed.
It can't get any easier than that. A $ 40 million dollar fix. Not Billion, not trillion. $40 million.
P.S. If more money is needed, have all members in Congress pay their taxes.


N.K. Missile II
North Korea's missile test was a failure as the projectile did not achieve orbit. So after all the media hype it ultimately didn't do what it was supposed to... kind of like an '86 Hyundai.


Treasury Crackdown
The good news is the Treasury Department is launching a crackdown to protect distressed homeowners from foreclosure rescue scams. The bad news is the biggest scam is being run by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner.

GM Classic Car Auction
In order to stave off bankruptcy, GM is auctioning off a fleet of collectible cars including a 1920 Chevy Model T truck. But experts say GM won't survive until it can also auction off the elderly retired workers who built that truck.


It's official, the White House fired the CEO of General Motors. And the mechanic who sat in President Obama's car wearing dirty coveralls and got oil on the seat -- he's through too.


Not every corporate CEO is a selfish fat cat. DailyFinance.com found one that shared his half-million dollar gain with his employees. JACK WINDOLF of Bollinger Insurance recently wrote more than 4-hundred of his employees checks for at least $1-thousand dollars each. He called it "a mini economic stimulus package." The money came from the $500-thousand dollars he made when he cashed in his shares of the company last year. At the end of the day, Jack kept only about $65-thousand dollars for himself.


In Seattle, a 90 year old man is getting his pilot's license. He's a good pilot. Apart from that thing where he sometimes walks into the cockpit and says -- "Now why did I come in here?"


Why Teenagers Are Moody
Teenagers are selfish, reckless and irritable because their brains develop slower than their bodies, scientists have claimed.

Psychologists used to blame the unpleasant characteristics of adolescence on hormones.

However, new brain imaging scans have revealed a high number of structural changes in teenagers and those in their early 20s.

Jay Giedd, at the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, Maryland, led the researchers who followed the progress of 400 children, scanning them every two years as they grew up.

They found that adolescence brings waves of so-called 'brain pruning' during which children lose about one per cent of their grey matter every year until their early 20s.

Among the last to mature is the very front of the brain's frontal lobe, which is involved in control of impulses, judgement and decision-making, which scientists say might explain some of the bizarre decisions made by the average teenager.

This area also controls and processes emotional information sent from the amygdala - the fight or flight centre of gut reactions - which may account for the short-tempers among some teenagers.

As grey matter is lost, the brain gains white matter, a fatty tissue which helps conduct electrical impulses and stabilise neural connections.

Scientists say that at this stage of life the brain acts as sponge for learning, but the lack of impulse control may lead to risky behaviour .



Strapped For Cash? Some Communities Are Printing Their Own Money!
A small but growing number of cash-strapped communities are printing their own money.
Borrowing from a Depression-era idea, they are aiming to help consumers make ends meet and support struggling local businesses.

The systems generally work like this: Businesses and individuals form a network to print currency. Shoppers buy it at a discount — say, 95 cents for $1 value — and spend the full value at stores that accept the currency.

Workers with dwindling wages are paying for groceries, yoga classes and fuel with Detroit Cheers, Ithaca Hours in New York, Plenty in North Carolina or BerkShares in Massachusetts.

During the Depression, local governments, businesses and individuals issued currency, known as scrip, to keep commerce flowing when bank closings led to a cash shortage.

By law, local money may not resemble federal bills or be promoted as legal tender of the United States, says Claudia Dickens of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing.
The IRS gets its share. When someone pays for goods or services with local money, the income to the business is taxable,

About a dozen communities have local currencies