FYI

   Risk taking may be great in some situations, but most of us would rather not put ourselves at risk for disease. The link here will take you to the Harvard Center website "Your Disease Risk" where an interactive tool helps you assess your personal risk for developing 12 types of cancer, diabetes, heart disease, osteoporosis, and stroke. After you follow the steps to estimate the risk for each, you will be given personalized tips to cut that risk. If you have a couple of minutes to spend, this might be a good site to investigate.


   Bananas! That's right, bananas! A study with 61,000 women at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden found that that those who ate 4 to 6 bananas a week cut their risk of kidney cancer by 54% compared to the women who didn't eat any bananas at all. I have never heard of that one before. Have you?



   I stumbled across this bit of trivia just today. I had been researching Canadian heroes for a student of mine, new to Canada from Jamaica. We've looked at some names of distinction from his first country, and now we're looking for some from his second country. I was reading about Canadians (British North Americans, at the time) who fought in the American Civil War. I knew that an estimated 30 to 50 thousand had done just that, but what I hadn't known before was that 29 of them won the Congressional Medal of Honour for their acts of bravery. They included one Corporal John McVeane from muddy old York, (Toronto) who was fighting with the 49th New York when he captured the colour-bearer and colours of the 58th Virginia Infantry at the Battle of Salem Church on May 4, 1863. I'll have to be sure to include Corporal McVeane in our list of special Canadians, especially since he fought for the north in this war to put an end to slavery in North America.