Hope all of you enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving with family and friends. It is my favorite holiday because there are no expectations except to show up at the dinner table and gorge myself! We traveled from Michigan to St. Louis to spend the Holiday with our daughter and four grandchildren. In fact, our grandson Zach celebrated his Bar Mitzvah and it was a special event.

About 18% of seniors on Medicare have diabetes; Hispanic are four times more likely to be hospitalized due to uncontrolled diabetes.

Focusing on Hispanic senior citizens with diabetes and covered by Medicare, a new effort between the American Diabetes Association (ADA) and the Patient Education Research Center at the Stanford University School of Medicine was announced yesterday by Health and Human Services (HHS). Their goal is to increase the number of diabetes self-management training programs (DSMT) in the U.S. for Hispanics and others.

Jean Harlow, born under the name Harlean Carpenter in 1911, was not the only woman in the family who had dreams of being an actress. Her own mother was bitten by the acting bug and she divorced her husband, Jean’s father, to move to Hollywood. Young Jean accompanied her mother. However, instead of staying in Hollywood to pursue acting, Jean’s mother instead ended up marrying a new man and moving to Chicago. For some time Harlow was in Chicago with her mother, though this would not last long.

The photo albums and shoe boxes full of family mementoes are only the beginning of the journey to discover the family history. Where do you start your search once the names, dates and other pertinent information are organized in your binder?

Last month I bemoaned the fact that it wouldn’t be too long before we started to see decorations popping up for the upcoming holidays. When I penned that comment I really had in mind the celebration of Halloween. Well, just this week Mary and I wandered into our favorite lunch haunt, namely, the Cracker Barrel Restaurant and lo and behold, it was as if someone had read my column and wanted to retaliate. There in the kitschy display of T-shirts and candy and hams was a huge table of Halloween items! In another corner, Thanksgiving paraphernalia leaped out at us and to complete the triumvirate – a Christmas display along with a festooned tree.

Ingrid Bergman’s childhood was rocky. The actress was born in Sweden in 1915 and lost her mother three years later. This meant she was raised by her single father until he too died when Ingrid was twelve. She was sent to live with an aunt, only to have this aunt also die within the year. Next she went to be with her uncle and was finally able to stay with him.
Despite all this tragedy at such a young age, Bergman did not let it get her down. She was interested in acting, pursuing it realistically once she was in her teens. Not only did she do school productions, she managed to get some extra work for films. She enrolled at Stockholm’s Royal Dramatic Theater School for college in 1933, and within three years she got the role anyone would envy.

Every three days, a student athlete in the United States dies of sudden cardiac death. The superb conditioning and physical appearance of these young athletes runs contrary to the perception that they could be harboring a serious underlying heart condition. Moreover, most cases of the leading cause of death in this group occur without prior warning symptoms.

How best to detect those at risk ahead of time and take steps to reduce the possibility have sparked a heated debate in the medical community and led to screening programs. Cardiac screening programs that seek heart conditions indicating a predisposition to cardiac arrest are beginning to emerge locally and nationally, but what to include in these studies is still up for discussion. The major problems are that screening every young U.S. athlete may not be feasible and may cause some students to be barred unnecessarily from sports participation.

Spencer Tracy is well-known for his quip that acting is about knowing your lines and not bumping into the furniture. Most people would tell you acting is a little more challenging than that, just as they would say Tracy had a challenging and sometimes difficult life.
Born in 1900, Tracy often had trouble with school, being pulled out by parents or expelled for unacceptable behavior. He was known to get into fights and to not bother showing up on time. Despite this reckless edge, for some time Tracy considered becoming a priest, something which would have made his father proud. However, the acting bug bit him, and he ended up going a different direction entirely.

Being retired and a senior citizen certainly has its perks. Daily when I go to the local gym I encounter businessmen who after their workout are leaving for the world of meetings, financial crises, recalcitrant employees and a whole host of irritations. My parting gesture to these denizens of the business world is to thank them for supporting me on Medicare and Social Security. I remind them that while they are toiling at work I am spending their money judiciously. It always elicits a laugh or sometimes just a smirk. Retirement? I’m loving it!

Do you have that infamous relative who is impossible to shop for? Are you looking for a unique gift idea for someone who has everything? A few family photos are all you need to create that one-of-a-kind gift.
For the chef you can create a personalized apron. Choose one photo or create a photo collage. Print out the photo on printable cloth which can be purchased at your local craft or office supply store. Sew the cloth on a purchased apron or you can stitch up an apron in the colors of your choice

Austin, Texas, October 14, 2008 - Better Business Bureau is warning senior citizens to be aware of an emerging telephone scam that is preying on grandparents nationwide. BBB has recently received reports about grandparents from California to New Hampshire who thought they were aiding their grandchildren by providing money for an emergency situation but were in fact giving thousands of dollars to Canadian con artists.

Current trends indicate it will be over 6% and largest cost-of-living adjustment since 1982; announcement due next month
Sept. 15, 2008 – Senior citizens may be headed for their largest pay increase – or cost of living adjustment – in more than 25 years, following this year’s Social Security COLA of only 2.3 percent. Projections are now being made that the increase for 2009 will almost certainly exceed six percent.

For some, Labor Day signals the end of summer as preparations for autumn and the accompanying holidays begin. Warm weather clothes including our white wardrobe and shoes are supposed to be returned to the closet. Children are back in school and weekend football games once again fill our calendars. For me and perhaps for other seniors, it is the beginning of summer! The parks are empty – restaurants have an abundance of available tables – save for seagulls, the beaches and resorts welcome visitors with open arms – and the highways are no longer cluttered. A senior citizen's dream! So as far as I am concerned summer does not end until Thanksgiving Day. So if you see me in my summer wardrobe in October, know full well that I am in a warm weather state of mind. You too?

Individual health insurance policies are expensive and often unavailable for early retirees
Aug. 27, 2008 - USA Today on Wednesday, as part of an ongoing series about retirement issues in the 21st century, examined how many of the 1.6 million baby boomers at age 62 who will become eligible for Social Security this year "have postponed plans to retire" because of health care costs and other economic concerns.

Does your family history contain a story of an ancestor’s immigration to the United States at the turn of the last century? If so, it is very likely that your relative entered the US through the Port of New York at the immigration station on Ellis Island.
From 1893 to 1924 the Port of New York accounted for 71% of all immigrant arrivals to the US. This time span was the single largest period of immigration in US history.

Marlon Brando grew up feeling unloved and unwished-for. His parents, both of whom struggled with alcoholism, did not raise their son to have self-esteem. Born in Omaha in 1924, Brando felt a need to become something he was not, if only to be more accepted. His mother did some acting in community theatres and his father, whom Brando said was abusive, ended up sending his son to military school. Brando was considered a rebellious and unruly child. Through his life he felt a lot of anger toward his father, and some people have said this anger helped Brando play his more intense roles.