my dad may need a pacemaker

A pacemaker could be miraculous for your dad. I know cardiac procedures are terrifiying, but having seen Hubby through so many I'm in danger of being blase about them. You may not recognize the peppy guy your dad turns into.

Oh, Sue. That's got to be scary and stressful!

Do they do anything different with their plant design? Or is it just standard biz as usual in their plants and protocols?

My brother who lives in Holland tells me there is a widespread feeling in his neck of the woods that France deliberately located their plants at the borders of their country so if there was a problem prevailing winds would carry radiation away from France (and to other countries but, hey, not France's problem.)

There is too much porn on my tumblr dashboard. How did it get that way?

Right now all my thoughts are about drawing. I need focus.

Here's a map, Scrappy. [link] It doesn't seem to support that theory. Since the plants have to be on a body of water and rivers are so often form borders, it might seem to skew that way, but you can't have plants on opposite sides of the country and not have winds blow across the country from one or the other.

Ginger, you would be horrified to learn that my local listserv is freaking out because they just learned that Walter Reed had a (medical) nuclear reactor on site (decommissioned in 1972), and you know we cannot trust the gov't to tell us the truth about these things, and no one is thinking of the children.

It hasn't reached vaccine levels of conspiracy theory. Yet.

What's really laughable about that, Scrappy, is that almost all of the major radiation exposure incidents have been on the nuclear medicine side. Not only have there been the incidents you've read about in which people got many times the radiation they were supposed to, but medical facilities tend to be sloppy with their nuclear material, at least by nuclear power standards. One of the worst exposure incidents happened when a radioactive source from an X-ray machine ended up in scrap metal, which then became radioactive table legs and other steel items.

I think the whole world would be able to live in peace and harmony if only there were more nacho fountains.

Trufax: melted cheese equals world peace.

The radio was telling me this morning that Japan's crisis will affect plans for a nuclear buildup in India.

I just don't know what India and Japan are going to do for power without the nuclear. The environmental impact of China's industrial revolution (mostly coal fueled) has been huge and ugly.

In short, abortions for some, miniature solar panels for others.

which then became radioactive table legs and other steel items.

Wacky and horrifying! Worthy of the Simpsons, or possibly the Oblongs.

I think the whole world would be able to live in peace and harmony if only there were more nacho fountains.

Trufax: melted cheese equals world peace.

Although I know that a nacho fountain means the delicious melted cheese product is what comes out of the fountain, what the phrase "nacho fountain" *actually* makes me envision is a contraption that shoots tortilla chips out of the top, where they cascade down to earth, occasionally poking out the eye of someone who stood too close.