Dear North Carolina,

I can not even express how grateful I am to you for implementing the new law that makes all restauants (& bars) in NC smoke free! I am so glad that as of January 2, 2010, I won’t have to worry about which restaurants I take my girls to. They will all be safe!

Moving to NC from CA, a state that has had that law since I was a kid, has been an amazing experience so far. I have to admit that I was a little shocked the first time we went out to eat in NC. I did a double take when we were asked “Smoking or Non-Smoking?” Of course the smell that hit my nose when we walked in should’ve been a dead giveaway as to what we were just asked. My husband and I asked the girls if we could try a different restaurant, but they wanted to stay put. It was one of their favorite places to eat back home, so it was hard to pry them away.

We remember the commercials back home from when we were growing up, saying that smoke doesn’t know how to stay in the smoking section and we were a little uneasy the whole time we were in there, wondering if we did the right thing eating in.

Over the next few months, we made it a point to eat at places that didn’t have smoking sections, or just pick up dinner and eat at home. Kinda took some of the fun out of going out to eat, but I’d rather have my lungs and healthy children than enjoy a meal that could harm us. Trust me… it was worth the extra effort.

We know that second hand smoke contains at least 250 chemicals known to be toxic, including more than 50 that can cause cancer. We also know that secondhand smoke causes heart disease and lung cancer in nonsmoking adults, and asthma and other respiratory illnesses in children. We also know that according to the California EPA, secondhand smoke is estimated to have caused approximately 3,400 lung cancer deaths and 22,700-69,600 heart disease deaths annually among nonsmokers in the US. *

So many scary facts that have made it a huge deal for us to protect our girls from exposure to secondhand smoke, this new law is going to make things just a little bit easier. Now, starting with the new year, we won’t have to be as selective of where we go out to eat, and I’m sure my girls are going to have more fun choosing where we go! I’m pretty sure that there are more folks that feel just as excited as we do!! So thank you!! We thank you, and our lungs thank you!

Sincerely,

The Mommy Brain Family

* Facts from the CDC.gov

More info: SmokeFreeNC.gov

Can I just say that by the end of the week, I will have purchased a licensed copy of Snow Leopard, and upgraded my OS for just $29?
The new Snow Leopard has a more advanced, more nimble Finder, with it’s 64-bit support. It will have a new look and new features for Exposé and Stacks. Backing up the machine with Time Machine will be up to 80% faster. The wake up and shut down times will be reduced up to 80%… It will have a 50% faster installation time, with a smaller footprint on your hard drive. It will free about 7GB of space! iChat will work and look even better than before. Automatic updates for printer drivers, automatic Time Zone setups… Really.. the list goes on and on… and all for under $30!!!

Can your PC do that??? Yeah.. I didn’t think so… pppppttttthhhhhttt on you Microsoft.. for charging your customers a minimum of $100 to upgrade from your already shoddy Vista to Windows7…

Go Mac! Thank you for making software that works, and is so much more affordable to the general population!

Wow. The last update is in January eh?? Well, there’s been a whole lot going on since January. Let’s see. In March, I went to Austin, TX for a conference called SXSW. That was a whole lotta fun and excitement. It was a week away, my first trip ever away from the girls, and it was 5 days. I was having a hard time with it. Luckily, there’s this thing called the internet… and Skype… I made it a point to come back and video chat with them (and hubby) every night.

In April, I was asked to be on a panel of 12 Challengers for the EA SPORTS Active 30 day challenge. I went to beautiful Santa Barbara, CA for the filming & kickoff of the 30 Day Challenge. I met and learned from Bob Greene.. He was pretty amazing…

The day after I got home from that trip, we moved to North Carolina. It wasn’t a quick move either. We drove across the whole damn country. We had just barely missed every natural disaster that could’ve been thrown at us. I’m not going to tell the entire story all over again.. You can read it all here. The good news is that we made it to our destination safe and sound despite a few major hiccups along the way.

Since we moved to NC, I’ve been to NYC and Chicago for a couple of different events, and possibly have another event planned for Las Vegas… We’ll have to see about that one though. The girls have turned 4. We’ve been to the beach several times, and hopefully will several times more. We’ve been to the “big city” a.k.a. Raleigh 2 times now, shopped at the outlet stores one time more than that. and I’ve been blogging giveaways and product reviews left and right. Not to mention, now I have to worry about HURRICANES! Sheesh… Living on the East Coast sure has it’s beauties, but I’m a little leery about dealing with those things… It was different in Japan… Here.. not so much fun..

Yes, it’s been a very busy 8 months… and the rest of the year is going to fly by just as quickly, if not faster. Feel free to subscribe to my RSS, or add me to you reader… I promise, I’ll take you on a whirlwind ride with me…

Oh, and be forewarned… I may blurt out certain words on this blog that I wouldn’t normally say on my other site, or on Twitter.. so just be prepared.. I’m definitely using this blog to let my hair down

And one more thing… the pictures on the top right hand side of my blog are mine. I took them, and if anyone tries to steal them… there will be hell to pay!

Thank you..