Massage Envy and KC Royals to Attempt Guinness World Record Sept. 17: Most People Being Massaged

Here's one of my most recent news releases. Come join us Saturday!

 Kansas City, Mo. … Summer and baseball season will soon be winding down, the perfect time for a relaxing break on Saturday, Sept. 17, as one of the massage recipients helping Massage Envy attempt to break – and reclaim – the Guinness World Record for "Most People Being Massaged" at the same time and place. Massage Envy and Massage Envy Spa locations in 10 states from coast to coast are teaming up with the Kansas City Royals for the event, which will be held from 5 to 6 p.m. in the Little K field inside Kauffman Stadium before the 6 p.m. home game between the Kansas City Royals and Chicago White Sox.

Massage Envy and Massage Envy Spa therapists from nine Massage Envy locations in Kansas City, Mo., and Leawood, Lenexa, Shawnee, Prairie Village, Overland Park and Olathe, Kan., are organizing the event. The current record of 263 massages is held in Australia. Massage Envy previously set the record in 2009 in Rosslyn, Va.

The public is invited to experience the fun and enjoy their “15 minutes of fame” as therapists go for the record, with the opportunity for bragging rights and inclusion in the Guinness Book of World Records. The wives of Royals pitchers Blake Wood and Sean O’Sullivan are expected to be among the participants.

Participants are encouraged to preregister by purchasing a $25 special event ticket through www.royals.com/massageenvy. The special event ticket includes the 10-minute Guinness Book of World Records massage plus admission to the game and a customized yoga mat. Light snacks and beverages will also be provided. A portion of the ticket will benefit the local chapter of The Arthritis Foundation.

“This is a real team effort by Massage Envy and the Royals,” said Les Snyder, regional developer for Massage Envy Heartland Inc. “We’ll also be supporting our national cause, The Arthritis Foundation, while giving 500 or more Kansas Citians the opportunity to enjoy the benefits of a massage plus getting to participate in setting a new world record.”

Therapists from across the United States are being recruited. For more information on therapist recruitment, go to www.MassageRecord.com.

At Massage Envy, an introductory one-hour massage session (a 50-minute massage and time for consultation and dressing) is just $49. Memberships are available for $59 per month and include a one-hour massage session. Members can enjoy unlimited additional one-hour massage sessions at the $39 member rate.

Log on to www.MassageEnvy.com to find the nearest Massage Envy clinic. All clinics are open seven days a week.

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KidsAndCars.org launches national safety awareness program

In June I volunteered to start helping KidsAndCars.org publicize information to save children from dangers in and around cars -- heat stroke from being left in a car or getting trapped in the trunk, deadly backovers and frontovers, etc.

On July 12 Good Morning America aired a story about two incidents that resulted in the deaths of boys aged 2, 4 and 8 who became trapped in car trunks. Stories have also appeared in the New York Times plus other national and local Kansas City media.

Here is our latest news release, distributed July 13:

KidsAndCars.org launches national safety awareness program

for hospitals to educate new parents about heat stroke danger

‘Look Before You Lock’ cards explain how memory lapses

can place children in danger when inadvertently left in cars

Leawood, Kan. – July 13, 2011 … KidsAndCars.org announces an innovative new pilot program to distribute safety cards through hospitals nationwide to educate new parents about how memory lapses can result in children suffering heat stroke and even death in hot cars. The “Look Before You Lock” program is the first of its kind to provide life-saving information at the very beginning of their baby’s life about the dangers of inadvertently leaving children alone in a vehicle.

“Educating new parents will help prevent tragic heat stroke deaths by giving them practical steps to jog their memory to take their children out of the car,” says Janette Fennell, founder and president of KidsAndCars.org, a national nonprofit child safety organization working to prevent injuries and deaths of children in and around motor vehicles.

Available in either English or Spanish, the cards will be distributed as part of the free information packets given to new parents when leaving the hospital. KidsAndCars.org is working in cooperation with Toyota Motor Sales, USA, Inc., which provided a grant to fund the program launch. “We support the important work of KidsAndCars.org in elevating this issue to a national level,” said Ed Bradley, regulatory affairs manager, Toyota Motor Sales, USA, Inc. “Vehicle safety is an issue that crosses all populations and communities, and Toyota strives to address this vital issue in a comprehensive way. This campaign is a great first step in educating the public in the prevention of injuries and fatalities to children in motor vehicles.”

Hospitals have been highly successful in stressing the importance of infant car seats, in many cases even requiring parents to prove – before leaving the hospital – that they know how to correctly restrain their baby. “Lack of sleep while caring for a newborn and changes in family routines can have lethal consequences,” Fennell points out. “It’s just as important that parents learn to be cautious about leaving children unattended in vehicles as they are about leaving them alone near a swimming pool or in a bathtub.”

Administrator David Strickland of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration commended KidsAndCars.org’s efforts: “With NHTSA’s focus on child passenger safety, we applaud any program that helps alert parents and caregivers to the risks of leaving children alone in vehicles. On hot summer days in particular, we encourage parents to make it a habit to look in their vehicles — both front and back — before locking the door and walking away.”

To request cards, hospitals simply need to notify KidsAndCars.org of the number of babies that are born at their facilities.

Individuals may also download and print copies of the card from the website, www.KidsAndCars.org.

Safety tips on the card include the memory device, BE SAFE:

Back seat – Put something in the back seat of your vehicle that requires you to open the back door every time you park – cell phone, employee badge, handbag, etc.
Every child should be correctly restrained in the back seat.

Stuffed animal – Keep a stuffed animal in your child’s car seat. Place it on the front passenger seat as a reminder when your baby is in the back seat.
Ask your babysitter or child care provider to call you if your child hasn’t arrived on time.
Focus on driving – Avoid cell phone calls and texting while driving.
Every time you park make it a routine to open the back door of your car to check that no one has been left behind.

“This is the first program of its kind,” Fennell noted. “New parents are highly motivated to do whatever it takes to keep their new baby safe, so this is the perfect time to present this information.”

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About KidsAndCars.org: Founded in 1996, KidsAndCars.org is a national nonprofit child safety organization dedicated to preventing injuries and deaths of children in and around motor vehicles. KidsAndCars.org promotes awareness among parents, caregivers and the general public about the dangers to children, including backover and frontover incidents, and heatstroke from being inadvertently left in a vehicle. The organization works to prevent tragedies through data collection, education and public awareness, policy change and survivor advocacy.

 

KidsAndCars.org warns against leaving children in hot vehicles this summer

News Release

KidsAndCars.org
2913 W. 113^th St., Leawood, KS 66211 (Greater Kansas City)
Office: 913-327-0013, Fax: 913-327-0014, www.KidsAndCars.org

Contacts:

Janette Fennell, 913-327-0013 or Janette@KidsAndCars.org
www.KidsAndCars.org <http://www.kidsandcars.org/>

Susan Pepperdine, 913-262-7414, cell 913-205-5304 or susan@pepperdinepr.com                       

KidsAndCars.org warns against leaving

children in hot vehicles this summer

In 2010 a record 49 children died of heat stroke in cars

Leawood, Kan. – June 7, 2011 … With hot summer days ahead, KidsAndCars.org is warning parents and caregivers to take extra precautions to prevent leaving children alone in cars. Through May 31 this year 8 children had already died of heat stroke in vehicles – close to the record-setting pace of 2010 when 49 infants and children died.

“It’s a record no one wants to see broken,” says Janette Fennell, founder and president of KidsAndCars.org, a national nonprofit child safety organization working to prevent injuries and deaths of children in and around motor vehicles. Since the group began tracking data and working on the issue in 1998, more than 500 children have died in these preventable tragedies.

A child’s body temperature climbs three to five times faster than an adult’s, especially in a hot car. In less than 30 minutes, the temperature inside a car can increase 35 degrees. An infant can die in as little as 15 minutes even on a mild 75-degree day.

Unfortunately, even the most conscientious parents can overlook a sleeping baby in a car. “The biggest mistake people make is to think ‘It couldn’t happen to me,’” Fennell said. “Memory experts point out that if you’ve ever forgotten a pot left burning on the stove, you’ve seen how easy it is to have a dangerous memory lapse.”

To prevent vehicular heat stroke deaths, KidsAndCars.org recommends learning the following safety tips. You could also tape them to the dashboard.

Back seat – Put something in the back seat so you have to open the door when leaving the vehicle – cell phone, employee badge, handbag, etc.
Every child should be correctly restrained in the back seat.

Stuffed animal – Move it from the car seat to the front seat to remind you when your baby is in the back seat.
Ask your babysitter or child-care provider to call you within 10 minutes if your child hasn’t arrived on time.
Focus on driving – Avoid cell phone calls and texting while driving.
Every time you park your vehicle open the back door to make sure no one has been left behind.

KidsAndCars.org also urges security personnel, parking lot attendants and the public to watch for children alone in a vehicle. If the child seems hot or sick, they should get them out as quickly as possible.

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About KidsAndCars.org: Founded in 1996, KidsAndCars.org is a national nonprofit child safety organization dedicated to preventing injuries and deaths of children in and around motor vehicles. KidsAndCars.org was the first to focus on preventing heat stroke deaths of children being inadvertently left in a vehicle. The organization is also the only one working full-time to educate parents, caregivers and the general public about additional nontraffic vehicle-related dangers to children, including backover and frontover accidents. The organization works to prevent tragedies through data collection, education and public awareness, policy changes and survivor advocacy.

A Rose by Any Other Spelling...Is Not a Rose

It's something of a curse to care about correct spelling and word usage. It's like the proverbial fingernails on the blackboard to see words misused...especially by those with college degrees. I once received an email note from a woman with a Ph.D. after her name that said, "Your welcome."

The explosion of social media has only made matters worse. Writing in a hurry seems to be an excuse for carelessness. Remember when Sarah Palin's use of "refudiate" on Twitter caused a stir? Then she claimed to be in a league with Shakespeare, who actually did know how to use -- and expand -- the English language.

You may be writing in a hurry, but readers will peruse your words at their leisure. If they see a typo or misspelling, it could lower their opinion of you by a notch or two. Then, instead of enhancing your credibility as you'd hoped, your expertise may actually be called into question.

Following are some of the words and phrases I've seen misused recently in social media, print publications and in books (with the wrong usage in parentheses):

"principal concern" (not "principle")
"go its own way" (not "it's")
"a tenet of belief" (not "tenant")
"taking some flak" (not "flack")
"led" (past tense of "lead")
"whose idea" (not "who's)
"impostor" (not "imposter")
"all right" ("alright" is never correct)
"fireplace mantel" (not "mantle")
"rite of passage" (not "right")
"someone with flair" (not "flare")
"real trouper" (not "trooper")
"had a big effect" (not "affect")
"straitjacket" (not "straightjacket")
"The Smiths" (not "Smith's)

My biggest pet peeve, though, is seeing "everyday" used when it should be "every day." Nearly "every day" (two words) I see an example of major companies misusing the word(s).  When you mean "every single day," it's two words. When you mean "ordinary," it's one word, as in:

"She wears her everyday clothes almost every day."

The good thing is that companies still need to hire professional writers like me to edit and proof their writing. After all, a rose by any other spelling ("rows"?) could be misunderstood.

Presenting the Book, ‘Tour Guide to Missouri's Civil War’

Through my grandmother Elizabeth Vandiver Selby, my family has a link to Missouri's history. Her ancestor Willard Vandiver was the Missouri senator who in 1899 said, “I'm from Missouri. You have got to show me.” In his honor my grandmother named two of her three sons Willard and Vandiver. The third son was my dad, Forrest Selby.

Both of my parents' families had been rooted in Fulton, Mo., since before 1850. The town is in Calloway County, which became known as the Kingdom of Callaway in the Civil War because of its Southern-leaning sympathies.

With these strong ties to Missouri's history, I'm relishing the opportunity to publicize a new book about the state's pivotal role in the Civil War. It's a fascinating look into our past and the rivalries that are still with us today.

Here's the news release I wrote for St. Louis writer Gregory Wolk:

‘A Tour Guide to Missouri’s Civil War’

Offers Driving Tours of Battles, Historic Sites

St. Louis ... In the recently released “A Tour Guide to Missouri’s Civil War,” St. Louis lawyer and first-time author Gregory Wolk offers “the first comprehensive sesquicentennial driver’s guide to Civil War battlefields and sites in Missouri.” Wolk has studied the Civil War for 30 years, and is president of Missouri’s Civil War Heritage Foundation Inc., founded in 2001 to educate people in Missouri and neighboring states about the state’s pivotal role in the war.

To commemorate the 150^th anniversary of the start of the Civil War on April 12, 186l, the book highlights more than 230 sites and scores of little-known historical facts. Few are aware, for example, that Missouri witnessed more battles than any other state except Virginia and Tennessee. “Almost half of the battles fought in 1861 occurred in Missouri,” the author notes.

The book’s 272 pages include nearly 400 black-and-white illustrations and 19 maps. Easy-to-follow directions are provided for five tour loops, each requiring about two days:

Loop One – St. Louis and Southeast Missouri: City and Swamps

Loop Two – North Central Missouri: Sick of Killing

Loop Three ­ South Central Missouri: A Knight to Remember

Loop Four – Region of Kansas City: Roots of Rebellion

Loop Five – Southwest Missouri: Ozarks Battlegrounds

Subtitled “Friend and Foe Alike,” the book details the state’s split loyalties. “Brother was sometimes pitted against brother, ” Wolk said. “One farm would be Confederate…and another farm up the road would be Union.” Historical vignettes throughout the book describe the wartime roles played by notables including Gen. Ulysses S. Grant and Gen. Sherman for the North and Gen. Joseph O. Shelby for the South, plus William Quantrill, Mark Twain, George Caleb Bingham, “Wild Bill” Hickok, Belle Starr and Jesse James.

The tour guide is the product of Wolk’s years of traveling the state’s highways and byways to visit Civil War sites and promote Civil War preservation and tourism. “A useful guide resource for the armchair historian, Wolk’s volume is an even more significant tool for those who enjoy venturing out to the locations where history was made,” wrote Thomas F. Curran, Ph.D., author of “Soldiers of Peace: Civil War Pacifism and the Postwar Radical Peace Movement.”

In the foreword Stuart Symington Jr., whose family has a rich heritage in the Show-Me State, points out that the Civil War affected Missourians “in more ways, for a longer period of time, and more profoundly than it affected the people of any other state in the union.”

Published by Monograph Publishing LLC in Eureka, Mo., “A Tour Guide to Missouri’s Civil War” may be ordered for $29.95 in softcover through the website, wwwcivilwartourguide.com, or through Amazon.com by searching “books” for ISBN 0979948266).

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Turning the Page on a Year in Books: 2010

It's been another great year in books. In varying degrees, they were entertaining, educational or enlightening. Often all three.

I also joined another book club at midyear, bringing my total to three:
Central Exchange (Overland Park, Kan.)
Fairway Book Club (Fairway, Kan., neighborhood group)
BlueStockings (Kansas City, Mo.)

Book group membership encourages you to read a much wider range of books. Plus, it's fun to discuss books with friends who provide insights you haven't considered.

Here's my list of books read in 2010.

Classics (read or reread):
Austen, Jane – Pride and Prejudice
Capote, Truman – A Christmas Memory, One Christmas, The Thanksgiving Visitor
Carlton, Jetta – The Moonflower Vine
Franklin, Benjamin – Autobiography
Golding, William – Lord of the Flies
Lagerlof, Selma – Gosta Berling's Saga
Sinclair, Upton – The Jungle
Silverstein, Shel – The Giving Tree
West, Dorothy – The Wedding

Philosophical and Life Lessons:
Alford, Henry – How to Live
Cathcart, Thomas and Daniel Klein – Heidegger and a Hippo Walk Through Those Pearly Gates
Dosa, David M.D. – Making the Round With Oscar (cat helping Alzheimer's patients)
Kick, Russ (editor) – Everything You Know About God Is Wrong
Rubin, Gretchen – The Happiness Project
Ulin, David L. – The Lost Art of Reading: Why Books Matter in a Distracted Time
Welch, Suzy – 10-10-10 (on decision making)

Autobiographies:
Alda, Alan – Things I Overhead While Talking to Myself
Brown, Helen – Cleo, "the cat who mended a family"
Heimke, Betsy Herold – Bring Cup, Plate and Spoon (Japanese prisoner of war as child)

Novels:
Barbery, Muriel – The Elegance of the Hedgehog
Bauermeister, Erica – The School of Special Ingredients
Durant Sarah – In the Company of the Courtesan
Horan, Nancy – Loving Frank (about Frank Lloyd Wright)
Larsson, Gtieg – The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
Maguire, Gregory – Mirror, Mirror
McCann, Colum – Let the Great World Spin
Robinson, Marilynne – Housekeeping
Rowling, J.K. – Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Selznick, Brian – The Invention of Hugo Cabret
Shapiro, Dani – Black & White
Simonson, Helen – Major Pettigrew's Last Stand

Nonfiction:
Dawkins, Richard – The Greatest Show on Earth
Farley, David – An Irreverent Curiosity
Fogarty, Mignon – The Grammar Devotional
Gladwell, Malcolm – Outliers
Gosling, Sam – What Your Stuff Says About You
Gregory, Leland – Stupid American History
Jonnes, Jill – Eiffel's Tower
Restak, Richard – The Secret Life of the Brain
Rosenberg, Scott – Say Everything (on blogging)

Newspapers and magazines are essential too, including The Kansas City Star, The Kansas City Business Journal, Newsweek, Smithsonian and The Saturday Evening Post.

I think it's important to read news on the printed page instead of online. Seeing the placement of stories on the page gives context, so you can see that the vote on "don't ask, don't tell," for example, is more important than Paris Hilton's latest antics. Online, celebrity gossip and (often intentionally) misleading or mistaken information is impossible to avoid. We still need editors to check the facts, as I was taught in the University of Missouri's journalism school.

I'm looking forward to another year of reading in 2011!

Honoring Pearl Harbor Survivors on the 69th Anniversary

Dec. 7, 2010, marked the 69th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor. I spent over a week working on publicity for our local survivors. Our Mission, Kan., event went well, with 200 people, including 60 middle school kids, attending.

I got to read my commemorative poem for #HonorFlight and introduce four survivors to tell their stories: Ed Russell and Jack Carson (both Army Air Corps) and Jess Dunnagan and Loyal George (both Navy). All the TV stations were there. Two other survivors also attended: Manfred Olson, 97, and Jim Baker (both Navy).

A story about my adopted Uncle Dorwin Lamkin (Navy) ran on the front page of The Star today: http://tinyurl.com/252aoxx. He was invited by the Dept. of the Navy to return to Pearl Harbor for commemorative ceremonies.

Also got him interviewed by a TV station in Honolulu: http://tinyurl.com/2a9ggg6. (Click on video screen on right side of page.) This report ran in Hawaii and on our NBC affiliate, KSHB-TV here.

This year at our event we had on display a metal relic from the USS Arizona, the ship that was bombed and sank at #PearlHarbor with a loss of 1,177 crewmen. Eventually the relic will be permanently encased in the Pearl Harbor Memorial Park in Mission, Kan.

On Dec. 8 there will be another Pearl Harbor event in Kansas City, with the addition of Pearl Harbor survivor, Wilbur Wright, 92, attending from Fairfax, Mo. I was his guardian on the Honor Flight in September 2009, and he insisted that I be there. So I have to go!

It is such a privilege to help these veterans get the recognition and appreciation they so deserve.