Here are some resources to help you find information about prescription and non-prescription drugs, including supplements.  You can look up side effects, what foods and drugs to avoid while taking a medication, and even find images of a drug.

• Drugs.com provides information about more than 24,000 prescription drugs, over-the-counter medicines and natural products.  You can find side-effects, dosage, use of a medication during pregnancy, drug interactions and a pill-identifier.
• Graedon's People's Pharmacy is geared for consumers and produced by Terry and Joe Graedon, authors of the print publication of the same name.  There is detailed information about home remedies: side effects, drug alerts and a page where readers can share their own stories. 
• MedlinePlus includes a section about drugs and supplements. Use it to find information about effectiveness, dosage and safety of herbal remedies and dietary supplements. Also find information about prescription and over the counter drugs. 
• NeedyMeds is a non-profit organization that helps people who cannot afford medicine or healthcare.  You can find drug coupons and other services at reduced costs, or free of charge.
• The Office of Dietary Supplements of the National Institutes of Health produces comprehensive fact sheets about dietary supplements that include information about historic uses, side effects, interactions with drugs and clinical studies being done.
• The Partnership for Prescription Assistance provides information about free or low-cost health clinics in your area.  You can use an online tool to determine your eligibility for a variety of patient programs and assistance, including Medicaid, Medicare, Patient Assistance Programs and co-pay programs.
• Pharmacy Checker.com collects rates and compares credentials, prices and customer feedback regarding pharmacies that operate online and through mail-order and fax.  Includes Canadian businesses too.
• RxIsk was founded by David Healy, author of Pharmageddon and other books.  This well-researched site by a team of international scientists and researchers, also uses MedWatch data.  You can search for drugs by various adverse effects, such as suicide or violence.  You can also use the interaction checker to see if your drug interacts with other drugs or food.
• The U.S. Food and Drug Association is responsible for testing and final approval of drugs on the market in the United States.  They are also responsible for many other regulatory activities.  Their site is continuously updated, informative and easy to use.  You can find information about buying medicines over the Internet, drug recalls and and other important information for consumers.  This is the home of MedWatch, where you can report adverse drug reactions. 

Is it going to snow? Will we beat the record for most days of rain? What was the high temperature on February 28, 2010? This page includes great resources to answer all of those questions, and more.

Forecasts and Observations

• National Weather Service: Official weather forecasts and observations from the federal National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
• University of Washington's Probability Forecast: Takes an unusual approach, clearly showing the probability and uncertainty levels of various weather scenarios.  
• Wolfram Alpha: A search for [weather portland oregon] brings up a lovely page of both forecasts and recent observations. 
• Climate Prediction Service: Predictions up to three months in the future.
• TripCheck: ODOT's site has information on current road conditions throughout Oregon.

Weather Records

• Portland Airport Station Normals, Means and Extremes:  Shows records for highs, lows, rain, and more for every month.
• Unique Local Climate Data: Links to rainfall maps and other climate data and records for Oregon cities.
• National Climatic Data Center's U. S. Records page: Daily, monthly, and all-time records throughout the US.

Weather Trends

• North American Climate Extremes Monitoring Mapping Tool: Use to map trends such as 'Minimum Temperatures Above Average' or 'Frost Days'. 
• Oregon Climate Change Research Institute: The clearinghouse for local research on climate change.

Looking for resources on global warming?

• Access Science: A database rich with research and definitions.
• Opposing Viewpoints: A database providing opinion and information on the controversy, along with supporting documentation. 
• Several of our article databases have diverse supplies of encyclopedia, magazine, and newspaper peices on global warming. Try the Gale Virtual Reference Library or MasterFILE Premier. Our Homework Center includes some great sites on global warming.

Weather History

• Weather.org's Weather History: Easy to use, and quickly brings up weather data for any day back to 1946.
• National Climatic Data Center: Includes temperatures and conditions for days in the past. Visit the Portland Station's page to bring up a dataset of observations for a particular month in the past. 

Extreme Weather

• Earthweek: The Diary of the Planet. Inclues a map of recent exceptional weather and geologic events. 
• Western Regional Climate Center: Includes detailed information on Climate Extremes and Major Storm Events.
• Extreme Weather and Climate Events: From the The National Climatic Data Center, this page links to a variety of information on natural disasters, extreme temperatures, and historic climate events. 

World Weather

• Current conditions and forecasts around the world can be found on most commercial weather sites, including Weather.com and Wunderground.
• World Meterological Information: Includes reports, news, and warnings about weather around the world.

From an observant, slightly snotty, artistic, dramatic hat designer comes this story of an escape from Hitler's Vienna. The human emotions are very real, though not always admirable. 

La Morenita - la Reina de México - la Diosa de las Américas. El 12 de diciembre, mexicanos tanto en el extranjero como en su patria rinden homenaje a Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe, símbolo duradero de su país y de su fé. Se ha sugerido que ella incorpora elementos de la diosa azteca Tonantzín junto con la Virgen católica, y como tal es un poderoso símbolo de mestizaje, uniendo diferentes elementos sociales en un todo viviente.

Did you ever play with one of these as a kid?

(photo by Collin Allen)

Today’s toy phones often look more like this:

But whether it’s a rotary or a flip, did you know that when your child plays with a toy phone he is gaining skills he needs to get ready to read?  Maria Montessori, the Italian educator, famously said that “play is the work of the child.”  By definition play is fun, but for young children it isn’t just fun.  It’s actually the most important way they learn.  

So how does playing with a phone lead to reading?   In the first couple years of life, when your baby or toddler plays with a phone it will most likely look something like a real phone.  As she grows older, though, around two or three years old, you might find her picking up a block and pretending that the block is a phone.  Then around four or five years of age she might even pretend the air between her fingers and thumb is a phone.  

This progression in the development of children’s play is an example of an important concept called symbolic representation.  They start out with something very similar to a phone (the plastic phone) representing a real phone.  They graduate to something that only vaguely resembles a phone (the block) and finally reach a point where they can picture the phone in their imaginations.  Learning to read requires a very mature sense of symbolic representation.  Readers have to understand that the black squiggles on the page represent real objects and ideas.  That’s no easy task!  

Imagine being a baby, just learning about what a cat is.  You hear the family’s cat purring.  You feel its soft fur when it rubs against you.  You see it as it jumps down from the bed.  You love that cat so much that for your first birthday someone gives you a plush cat toy.  It doesn’t purr or jump, but it is soft, and you recognize it by its four legs, tail, whiskers and cat-like face.  Later, in preschool, your teacher reads Kitten’s First Full Moon.   Of course that cat isn’t even soft, but by now you have learned to recognize the image of a cat, even in its two-dimensional form.  In fact you have the image of a cat in your head, and when you play house with your friends you “feed” your pretend cat, even though there is “nothing” there.  Finally, when you are in school, learning how to read, you learn that these squiggles - cat - represent three sounds (kuh-ah-t), and that when we put those sounds together they make a word - cat! - and that word represents the sweet, purring ball of fur you know so well at home!

So enjoy playing with your child, and as you play together know that you are helping her on the long and glorious path called “learning how to read!”