The Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has launched a crackdown on drunk driving coinciding with the 2011 winter holiday season.
Auditions for Orcas Has Talent and Orcas Has Talent Junior will be held at the Orcas Grange on Saturday, Jan. 21.
“Enter your act now for your chance to compete for the grand prize winnings of $500,” organizers say.
Your Orcas Fire & Rescue EMTs study from a primary textbook authored by the American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons. The AAOS has a vested interest in fall prevention, and so do we at Orcas Island Fire and Rescue.
Our medical director, Dr. Michael Sullivan, often says, “If it’s predictable, it’s preventable.” Nowhere is this more true that with falls. Benjamin Franklin said, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”
According to the US Center for Disease Control, falls are the leading cause of death in adults ages 65 and older. More than 90 percent of hip fractures are caused by falls.
by MARTIN TAYLOR
Special to the Sounder
If you want to start the New Year with a jolt, take part in an Orcas Tradition: The Orcas Island Rowing “Polar Bear Plunge.”
“Do you like butter”, asked my mother when I was a little girl, while holding a golden dandelion under my chin. I never did know if it was the yellow reflection of the petals or the dusting of pollen that provided the answer. There were plenty of dandelions in our big yard, and my sisters and I loved to blow the seeds from the mature heads and watch them float away in the breeze. Dandelions were an accepted part of life here in our island community, though our family did not eat them.
Betty Densmore is trained in Food and Nutritional Sciences. She enjoys gathering wild edibles on walks through the woods surrounding her home in Olga, and keeping her family and friends healthy with organic bone broths and traditional fermented foods.
Orcas Island’s jjunior rowing crew will be at Island Market on Friday, Dec. 23 from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. selling 2012 Polar bear Plunge Tee shirts and Orcas Island Rowing hats.
They will also be taking orders for the 2012 annual rowing club dinner.
This Friday, Dec. 23, the Orcas Elementary School Science Club will conduct a night time low-tide walk around Indian Island beginning at 8:00 pm on the beach below the county park in Eastsound.
The San Juan Islands Chapter of Puget Sound Anglers donated the proceeds from its 2011 Resurrection Salmon Derby to Long Live the Kings Glenwood Springs Hatchery today.
The $6,900 donation represents $100 out of each $400 entry fee for the 69 teams that entered the tournament this year.
Struggling families are finding some financial relief, thanks to Orcas Montessori School’s Appleseed Scholarship Fund and the community members who make the fund possible.
The Orcas Montessori School is a three-year early learning program for children ages two-and-a-half to six. The needs-based Appleseed Fund provides partial tuition assistance to families who do not qualify for ECEAP.
A cheery polyphony of notes will rise from 40 gleaming instruments when Orcas Island Community Band takes the Orcas Center stage this weekend for its annual holiday fete.
“We’ve got some really fun and upbeat and exciting music that we’re going to be playing,” said band president Moana Kutsche. “It helps us get into the holiday spirit and we’re looking forward to sharing that with the community.”
The concert is on Saturday, Dec. 17 at 2 p.m., a time designed to be family friendly.
The Met: Live in HD’s fifth opera of the 2011 season, “Rodelinda” by George Fredric Handel, airs at Orcas Center on Sunday, Dec. 18 at 1 p.m.
It stars Renée Fleming in one of her greatest roles and features the beautiful music of the Baroque era.
ONE: Shop locally. TWO: Get into the holiday spirit. THREE: Donate to the food bank.
by Cali Bagby
Journal/Weekly reporter
Two days after the tsunami struck Japan, one man was found floating nearly 10 miles out at sea on the roof of his house.
When Susan Osborn saw the image of this tiny, bedraggled figure in an online story, it struck a chord with her, not just because it was a story of survival amidst death and destruction, but because she had come to call Japan her second home – a home now in peril.
