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✽ One more thing to worry about -- Chagas disease ~ link

✽ 6.9 earthquake in Qinghai province, China ~ link

✽ The Arizona House further complicates the immigration problem with yet another "immigration bill." (Immigration issues in the US are supposed to be handled by the federal government but because Congress has been unable to create a workable reform plan states like Arizona are attempting to take the matter into their own hands -- which then makes it more difficult for a coordinated national plan once they get their act together on the federal level.) ~ link

✽ So, get rid of the pennies and the dollar bills. ~ link

More on the new quarter

The new Guam quarter dollar coin has the words "Guahan I Tanó ManChamorro" -- Chamorro for "Guam -- Land of the Chamorro". Ray Gibson was asking on the radio this morning if any other US coins have carried language that is not English or Latin? I can't think of any -- up to this point.

However, the new quarter recognizing American Samoa carries the Samoan phrase "Samoa Muamua le atua" ("In Samoa, God is first"). The quarter for Puerto Rico carries carry the Spanish phase "Isla del Encanto" ("the enchanted island").

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• And now everyone can carry some of Guam around with them. The Guam commemorative US quarter-dollar coins are being released this week. ~ link

• No gimmick -- how to save thousands on your mortgage payments ~ link

• Stop the presses! New revelation -- really ripe mangoes remind me of really ripe apricots. They are similar in texture and perhaps somewhat in flavor. Both fruits seem to have a lot of beta-carotene. I love them both -- although not really really ripe for either.

• Jack Kim outlines some of the factors behind North Korea's latest round of nuclear saber-rattling. ~ link

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...In an effort to divert customer attention from how long they have to wait in line, 37,000 US post offices have removed the clocks from their retail areas.

It sounds like somebody with a psychology 101 education thinks that he has figured out how to keep customers from going postal. Of course, removing the clocks also means that the postal workers will be even less aware of time and the lines will grow longer -- and customers will be even grumpier. The law of unintended consequences.

At the very least this is a major PR goof for the PO.

The other option is efficiency but that would demand more of the system than the system can apparently handle.

...During their first year out of law school new attorneys working for high powered New York firms are making $160,000 a year. Why so much? Is that enough to keep them put? Or is there something else to life?

...Eugene Cho on pastoral health.