Too good to pass up

On the twelfth day of Christmas, mellificent sent to me...

Twelve quilts reading

Eleven texas shopping

Ten bookworms a-singing

Nine beads quilting

Eight libraries advertising

Seven politics a-writing

Six forests a-gardening

Five ne-e-e-ew orleans

Four star wars

Three guild wars

Two old houses

...and an art in a history.

Get your own Twelve Days:

Twelve million dollars

It's gotten warm - 70-ish in the daytime - which I don't like in the winter, because it usually means fog. I hate fog. I understand that this happens because when it's warm this time of year, the air is warmer than the water - and since we're completely surrounded by the damn water here, guess what happens. Today it was foggy in the morning, burned off for a while, then rolled back in after lunch. Ugh. I'm ready for a cold front. Not that we're supposed to have another one any time soon.


My boss went downstairs to get coffee this morning and came back saying they were having a press conference in the lobby. I think I mentioned the big donation UTMB got in the BP settlement when it was first announced, but apparently it became official today. The local paper did a good article yesterday about the work the burn unit does (warning: more info than you may want to know about burn treatments there), and that's where the money is going.

(Also, here is the 60 Minutes segment about the BP explosion. Which is pretty mind-blowing, and Incidentally, was also apparently Ed Bradley's last piece.)


Galveston basically has that amazing burn unit because there are industrial areas all around us, so there's lots of burn patients to learn on. Even out in the water, there are oil platforms, and patients get brought in pretty regularly from those by helicopter, I understand. On the land side, there's Texas City, and if you read the Galveston Daily News article, you saw that the burn unit was founded after the other Texas City explosion, a much bigger one over 50 years ago.

After we watched the 60 Minutes piece, I said, You know, I coulda told you the BP plant probably needed updating. It's right on Highway 146 so you drive right by it if you go to Texas City or anywhere further up Galveston Bay. That plant is old, it's very obvious. But we're all so used to seeing it we don't pay any attention, normally. And it refines, I seem to recall, a significant portion of all the oil sold in this country. Kinda scary, once you do think about it.


(I intended this entry to be about Galveston, and it got a little sidetracked. I'll talk about that another day.)