Four days worth of houseguests this past weekend resulted in a recycle bin overflowing with Costco boxes, cardboard egg containers, gift wrappings, beverage bottles and plastics.  I proudly reviewed how carefully we separated recyclables from trash and sincerely congratulated my household for its diligence in saving the environment by limiting our contribution to the Miramar landfill and thus extending its life. 

And then I recalled my interview with San Diego City Council Member Donna Frye, parts of which will be incorporated into the KPBS TV March 20th Envision program, “San Diego’s Waste Woes.”  Frye is the Chair of the City Council’s Natural Resources and Culture Committee whose area of responsibility includes solid waste disposal and recycling.  She told me that the city will actually be losing about $2 million over the next couple of years from waste that doesn’t go into the landfill, but instead goes into recycling.  Although she was specifically talking about construction industry waste, the overall message was clear, that it costs many millions to haul and dispose of the city’s residential waste and that someone has to pay for it.

February 18, 2008 by Gloria Penner

I didn’t even know that I was having my first experience with someone with Alzheimer’s Disease – that dread destroyer of the once-vigorous and highly functioning human brain.  Actually, none of his friends or family suspected the reason that this highly respected, brilliant academician couldn’t follow the directions of a professional square dance caller hired for the party.  It wasn’t until weeks later that a test confirmed the presence of confused thought and impaired memory.  The cause was laid to the tangles and plaques that invade the brain afflicted with Alzheimer’s, attacking the pathways and connections.  It took about five years for the victim’s disease to progress from forgetfulness to incoherence to incapacity to death.  In that time, his family went from disbelief to devastation.  That’s what Alzheimer’s does to  patients and to many of those who become their caregivers.

An estimated 5 million Americans are afflicted and with age comes an increased frequency of the disease.  Now with millions of baby boomers entering their seventh decade, an Alzheimer’s diagnosis is made every 72 seconds.  It has become the scourge of the first decade of the 21st       century, is expected to become more intense and destructive as each year passes, and has attracted the attention of journalists, writers, and media producers.

It’s been seven years since author David Shenk wrote “The Forgetting,” which was lauded as the definitive work on Alzheimer’s as well as a remarkable addition to the literature of the science of the mind.  In January, 2004, PBS produced a documentary inspired by the book and Shenk remains engaged in the urgency of Alzheimer’s growing toll.  He was in San Diego recently and I sat down with him to talk about his work, the disease, and the future.

January 16, 2008 by Gloria Penner

I awoke this morning to an unusually balmy January day.  Usually I welcome the 10 degree temperature boost in the middle of winter.  But the winds were active, even in my coastal neighborhood, and my mood shifted.  The recollection of the October wildfires and the havoc and the heartache they caused made me anxious.  The anxiety increased as I drove east to my office at KPBS through a grey pall hanging over the freeway until I realized that it was a light fog and not smoke in the air.

My apprehension about more devastating fires visiting San Diego was not relieved by the interviews I conducted earlier this week with San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders, San Diego Council President Scott Peters, and County Supervisor Dianne Jacob.  She represents those unincorporated areas that are so susceptible to Santa Ana blazes.  In another interview, I questioned Supervisor Ron Roberts about the plan he and the Mayor had unrolled at Sanders’ State of the City address last week.

December 6, 2007 by Gloria Penner

Drug addiction and the misery it brings to the addict, family, and friends have become well documented as substance dependency grows in numbers and spreads through every level of society.  It’s not a new affliction. Historical evidence dates narcotics use back to at least 4000 B.C.  In the United States, before prohibition, psychotropic substances were the essential ingredient in many popular medicines .  Morphine, cocaine, heroin, and opium were found in a variety of infant syrups, cough medications, toothache remedies, headache tonics and the popular drink, coca-cola.

Despite government’s attempts to suppress drug use through legislation and criminal penalties, drug use and drug addiction have exploded in the 21st century.  In California, at the start of the century, alcohol addiction was most prevalent.  Now, just 7 years later, the culprit is methamphetamine.