Nancy Figueroa Writes

I'm so glad today is the last day of February. For a short month it was long and brutal! I can't wait for the snow, the cold and the grey to vanish. Usually I go for a long walk three to five times a week, but not this month. It has either been too cold or too icy. On the upside, I've had more time for reading.  This year I've recorded in my Book Lover's Diary the title and author of each book I've read and I've rated each book with one to four stars. My Mom gave me the diary in 2000 but this is the first year I'm dutifully recording every book I read. So far I've read eight books, or almost one a week. Six of the eight are non-fiction: Becoming , by Michelle Obama; A Smell of Burning, A Memoir of Epilepsy by Colin Grant; Educated , by Tara Westover;  Walk It Off, A Memoir by Ruth Marshall;   Intrepid Soul, A Memoir of Returning Home ,   by Leanda Michelle and Women Who Walk With Wolves , by Clarissa Pinkola Estes. The two fiction books wer...

Brilliant idea: Eight rules for dealing with seizures, printed  on a milk cartons! Italy is one of my favourite countries, but now I love it even more. The Italian League Against Epilepsy and the Italian Association Against Epilepsy recently launched an initiative to increase public understanding of epilepsy. If you can imagine, information about seizure first aid is now printed on milk cartons! This brilliant initiative is being offered in collaboration with Lattebusche Dairy, a dairy co-op in the north-eastern region of Italy. As well, information about epilepsy has  been printed on more than 100,000 flyers. In Italy 500,000 people have epilepsy and about 30,000 people are diagnosed with it each year. In Canada about 300,000 Canadians have epilepsy and about 15,500 are newly diagnosed every year. Epilepsy is common, and yet in some countries there is a stigma attached to it. It is seen as something that should be hidden.  "This awareness campaign i...