Big money ... just call me Mr. High Roller

So, this morning I'm sitting at home, waiting on the limo to take me to the Dothan airport, where I'll board the most luxurious regional aircraft available (most likely a CRJ200) to wisk me away to Tahoe (they tell me it's only a 15-minute flight).

Once there, I'll accommodate myself at the Holiday Inn Express between jaunts to the high roller rooms at the local casinos. Well, not exactly.

While I'm not much of a gambler (it's just not my thing, I guess), I've begun placing HUGE money bets at a place called centsports.com.

Well, they're not exactly huge. In fact, they're not big, either. In fact, it's quite sad.

But it's fun. Damn fun.

Centsports.com is a free sports book that'll actually pay your winnings. They give you 10 cents to play with. When you reach $20, whis probably isn't that hard if you try, they'll cut you a check. Simple as that.

Lose your bet and all your money? Not really a problem. Just click on Abe Lincoln's head, and they'll give you another $.10 to play with. Trust me, it works.

Sign up a few friends, and they'll cut you 5 percent of your cronies' winnings.

If nothing else, it'll make me follow -- at least a little closer -- some sports I don't.

If you want to sign up, click here. Be my crony.

I can kick your butt in the kitchen

Salsa-marinated snapper, blue cheese-stuffed jalapenos make an interesting dinner

I’m now confident I could kick your butt in the kitchen. That includes you, too, Granny.

I’m impressive, to say the least.

I had planned on marinating some red snapper in a tequila-lime marinade and grilling it for supper on Tuesday. So, I ran through the grocery store and grabbed the few things I could remember from the recipe.

But, when I unpacked the groceries and began to prep the marinade, I realized I’d forgotten the most important part – the limes. No lime juice in the bottle, either. OK, so my memory’s not that impressive. But, read on.

So, I made something up, and it was, without a doubt, one of the best dishes I’ve ever made.

I chopped up some garlic, parsley, red onion and tomatoes. I put half of it into the food processor with some melted butter, olive oil, salt and pepper and processed it to make something that resembled a spicy (think garlic-and-onion spicy, not deli) mustard.

I rubbed the concoction on the fish and topped it with the other half of the chopped ingredients – like a pile of fresh salsa, I guess. I wrapped the fish in aluminum foil and let it soak for a couple hours.

The fish cooked well, although I did take it off the grill, open the foil and place it under the broiler for a few minutes, just to finish it off. The end result was probably the most satisfying fish dinner I’ve ever eaten. We simply pulled back the foil and dove right in. Hell, even the baby ate it.

But, by far, the most interesting flavor of the night was the jalapeno poppers I made. I cut the top off five peppers, cut out the seeds and membranes and stuffed them with a crumbled blue cheese, then secured the caps with toothpicks. The hot peppers and the savory blue cheese was one of the strangest and most satiating flavors I’ve ever tasted.

Thumbs up to courts, FDA

Decision to expand access to Plan B is the right one

It just makes sense.

Yesterday’s FDA decision – under a court order that decided the organization had bowed to political pressure in 2006 – to allow women 17 and older non-prescription access to the emergency contraceptive known as Plan B is a good one.

Young women face enough obstacles when dealing with the possibility of an unintended pregnancy. That the government decided to remove one of these barriers shows a move toward common sense, safety and responsibility.

What is Plan B? Well, I’m no doctor, but Plan B is basically a high dose of the same hormones contained in ordinary birth controls pills – levonorgestre. It is used as an emergency, or back-up birth control method, and is not intended for use as a primary contraceptive.

Because, let’s face it. Kids have sex. The Guttmacher Institute reports that most teens become sexually active around the age 17. But, by the time they’re 19, about 70 percent are sexually active.

Those opposed to the decision came out swinging with concerns that the drug isn’t safe.

Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America, told onenewsnow.com that parents should be livid.

“Even well-known advocates (for Plan B) -- researchers in favor of the morning-after pill -- have admitted that it is very ineffective,” Wright points out. “It doesn't reduce pregnancies, and making the drug easy to get without a prescription neither reduces pregnancies or abortions.”

Researchers at Princeton University disagree.

“Labeling for Plan B and other emergency contraceptive pills that contain only the hormone progestin states that the treatment reduces your risk of pregnancy by 89%,” the university’s Office of Population Research reports. “This doesn’t mean that 11 percent of women will get pregnant using these pills. It just means that this type of emergency contraception prevents 89% of the pregnancies researchers would expect to happen when women don’t use birth control, their regular contraceptive fails, or they are forced to have sex (in other words, they have “unprotected sex”).

Moira Gaul, Family Research Council's Director of Women's and Reproductive Health, called the ruling a policy decision, not one based on science and reason and compassion.

Well, Ms. Gaul, a number of the world’s most reputable medical organizations and researchers HAVE based their decisions on science.

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the American Medical Association, American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Association of Pharmacists have given their stamp of approval.

Collectively, that’s enough for me.

Welcome to three_blogs_full

Glad you stopped by.

three_blogs_full is my first attempt at the blogging world, so I'd ask you to bear with me. We'll have good times and bad times, and I'll go through some growing pains. I am, at best, a mediocre writer with a limited vocabulary and a knack for unimpressive debate. But I, like most anyone else, enjoy a good back-and-forth.

Here, I'll share some random thoughts on a number of topics. Part diary. Part editorial. Part self-help. As the introduction says, we'll talk about all kinds of things ... sports, news, social issues, politics, parenting, work and food (probably my favorite).

If you want, follow along. Be sure to leave your comments, both good and bad. I'll do my dead-level best to answer every comment.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see you soon.