Justin Timberlake's Many Endorsements - Celebrity Substance - Alyssa Caverley

CELEBRITY SUBSTANCE celebritysubstance.weebly.com Justin Timberlakes annual golf tournament and concert benefitting the Shriners Hospitals for Children last week peaked my interest. I wanted to look at some of the other good things that he is doing. Timberlake is usually in the tabloids for being a playboy and focused only on his career, but I am slowly finding out that he is also a supporter of many charities. He also hosts and organizes many concerts benefitting certain charities, like the one he organized last week with a host of A-list celebrities. Timberlake started the tournament and concert in 2008. It was so successful that he decided to do the concert again this year. This years concert featured a long line-up of music stars including, Taylor Swift, Alicia Keys, Snoop Dogg, Jay Sean, Ciara and, TLC. The Shriners Hospitals for Children is dedicated to improving the lives of children by providing pediatric specialty care, innovative research and teaching programs. The Hospitals do not charge families for their services and focus on the needs of the children even if the family does not have insurance or the financial ability to pay. Timberlake is an advocate for the hospital and participates in the weeklong golfing and concert event in Las Vegas with all proceeds going to the Hospitals. In late 2007, Timberlake donated $100000 from the Australian leg of his tour to Wildlife Warriors, which was founded by Steve Irwin. The charity was founded to educate others to the ...



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kxxFByS1tLc&hl=en

Top 10 Tips Before Traveling Overseas

1. Travel Insurance

International SOS evacuation cost up to US$100,000. In some countries, doctor visit can cost up to US$100 per trip, and hospitalisation can cost up to US$5000. Accidents can happen anytime, and when it happen, travellers can pay dearly if they are not insured.

Travel insurance cost around US$25 - US$100 up depending on duration and location. Travel with a peace of mind, always buy travel insurance when out of the country, even if it is only for a 1 - 2 days trip. Why take unnecessary risk just to save that hundred dollars?

And when should you buy your travel insurance? Once you book your trip, and pay in full. This will cover for any unforeseen circumstances, some of which may be for reasons beyond your control (e.g. death of a family member less than 1 month from the trip, house break-in during the trip, flight cancellation).

2. Photocopy important document

Make multiple copies of your passport, credit cards, itinerary, credit card number and hotel information. Keep one copy with your love ones, and put the remaining into a few luggage.

We always keep a copy with us (if we leave the original in the hotel safe) in case of spot check.

3. Make sure passport is valid for more than 6 months

Some countries may not allow entries for passport with less than 6 months validity. There were many cases travellers were ask to turn back home from the destination country due to this problem.

4. Bring sufficient medications / have vaccinations

If you are on regular medication, remember to bring at least 3 - 5 days extra doses in case there is a delay and you are not able to leave the country.

As medication overseas are expensive, and may not be suitable for your needs, it is important to bring your own medication. We always have the following medication whenever we travel: - flu and fever - diarrhoea and stomach pain - dizzy / nausea - jet lag - plaster for cuts - oil for sprain, muscle ache

Never check-in your medication. If the airline has a limit on the amount of fluid to bring up (e.g. 100ml), check with the airline what can be done if you are dependant on the fluid medication.

In some countries, it is important to get vaccinated. Check with your family doctor at least 3 months before your trip as some vaccine needs a period of 1 - 2 weeks before it is effective.

5. Emergency numbers in the country / embassy

In case of emergency in the country, do you know whom to contact? It is always important to have your embassy / consulate address and phone number with you.

6. Take note items in luggage or take a photograph

Millions of luggage are lost each year in the airline industries.

If one of your luggage is lost, do you know what are the items inside before you claim from the airline or insurance? Take note of the items, or better still, take photos of the item in each luggage.

Never put valuables into your check in luggage.

7. Do not check in all luggage

It is nice to go up the plane empty handed, especially during transit. But what if all your luggage are lost? It is always good to keep some clothing in your handheld luggage. The last thing you want to happen when you reach your destination, all you have is the one set of clothing on you.

What we do is keep at least one set of everything on our hand carry luggage, especially winter clothing.

8. Mark your luggage

If you have noticed, many air stewards' luggage are marked very colorful with lots of stickers in a non-organise manner. The reason is to "personalise" the luggage so that no one will mistakenly take your luggage, and you can identify your luggage from a far distance.

9. Familiar with local laws / customs

Check out the do and don't of the country. A certain action that means very little in one country may mean a lot in another country. For example, do not kiss in the public area when traveling in the Middle East.

10. Carry 2 credit cards from different banks

If possible, carry credit cards by 2 different banks. If for any reason your credit card fail, and for a remote reason, due to the bank, at least you have a backup.

Drive Safely On the Highway

Although the term "highway" has had a couple of meanings when it comes in the United States, more or less, the connotation that it is an important road that connects areas or cities that are separated by long distances. However, looking more closely into the meaning of this term, other meanings include a road that is high-speed (just like expressways and freeways), a main road that goes through distances outside of the city, or just about any road you can find.

Since highways are roads that go through many cities and connect these places despite long distances, this becomes the main facility which quite a number of large commercial vehicles use to transport their cargo. In fact, at present, this number of commercial vehicles has increased dramatically. Some people who are not confident enough in their driving skills could easily be overpowered by a fear of being crashed by these large machines.

Transport Canada has shared with the public some safety tips on how to drive safely on highways and keep your calm despite having these large vehicles running beside you. Transport Canada is a department of the government of Canada. Mainly, it is responsible for developing regulations, policies, and services of transportation and related matters in the mentioned country.

Commercial vehicles have larger blind spots compared to the ordinary vehicles. Remember to keep away from these blind spots. How do you do this? Keep in mind that if you cannot see the driver in their side mirror, it is very much possible that the driver would not even notice you there.

If in case you are driving in front of a large commercial vehicle like trucks and buses, signal your intentions to maneuver or stop well in advance. This is to warn the driver about what you are about to do so they have ample time to react properly. The thing behind these trucks and buses are that they actually do need more time and distance to maneuver and stop compared to most cars and vehicles.

When it comes to wet roads, remember that these large commercial vehicles are prone to spray a lot of water, and mud around. Always remember to turn your wipers on so you can always see clearly.

Doug Poindexter-My Kind of Carrying On

SUN 1954 Rockabilly/Hillbilly Bop Doug Poindexter & The Starlite Wranglers. Born in Arkansas, he too went to Sun in 1954 and cut (May 25, 1954) two sides of Hillbilly weepers : Now She Cares No More For Me and My Kind Of Carrying On. Published on June 1rst, 1954 on Sun 202. Two of the Wranglers wereBill Black (bass) and Scotty Moore (lead-guitar), soon to back up the young Elvis less than two months later. Good hillbilly sides, tending towards Rockabilly. Poindexter then left for insurance business..



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pc5VrzURUg4&hl=en

In the case of domestic violence is a pre-existing medical condition?

Insurance companies have a number of pre-existing medical conditions that add to the risk associated with insuring someone. Whereas most pre-existing medical conditions are illnesses that directly impact the mortality of an individual, several politicians and advocacy groups question whether some insurers have taken these clauses too far.

In the past, some insurance companies believed that a victim of domestic violence brought the same health risks to the table as those with pre-existing medical conditions such as diabetes and heart disease. As a result, insurers chose to deny coverage or "rate up" a policy based on a history of abuse.

While the most recent instances of this underwriting practice occurred in the health insurance market in the mid-to-late nineties, domestic violence victims may also find themselves vulnerable to insurance discrimination in the life and disability markets.

Victims of domestic violence are seven times more likely to go back to their abuser. The risk of harm associated with leaving an abusive partner doubles once the victim decides to leave for good, according to statistics by the Family Violence Prevention Fund, a San Francisco-based advocacy group concerned with educating the public about domestic abuse.

Violence in the home can also have lasting psychological and physical effects on its victims. The FVPF reports that women who are victims of domestic violence are 80 percent more likely to have a stroke, 70 percent more likely to suffer from heart disease, 60 percent more likely to have asthma, and 70 percent more likely to drink heavily than women who have not been exposed to partner violence.

And it doesn't stop there. Domestic violence can have a devastating impact on reproductive health, adding to the likelihood of miscarriages, and has been linked to the prevalence of risky sexual behavior and sexually transmitted diseases such as HIV, according to AARDVARC.org, a non-profit organization dedicated to combating family and relationship violence.

The FVPF estimates that intimate partner abuse, rape, and stalking costs the medical and mental health services industry $8.3 billion annually in direct healthcare costs, in addition to the cost of lost productivity at work.

While domestic violence may raise certain mortality concerns, some say there isn't enough evidence for insurers to cancel or deny a policy, create exclusions or charge a higher premium based on that fact.

Kim McKeown, spokesperson for the Society of Actuaries (SOA) says that in some states there are no laws on the books or limited protections involving adverse actions against domestic violence victims, but it's highly unlikely that an insurance company would take such a position.

"We haven't seen or heard any evidence of underwriting domestic violence as a pre-existing medical condition in the life insurance market," says McKeown. "It is allowed in 14 states, but it's our understanding that it's not being applied by insurers and that very few insurers would take that approach."

Other insurance experts agree.

"It wouldn't be considered a "pre-existing condition" per se, but it may factor into the underwriters thought process as it pertains to a final rate class," says Ryan Pinney, brokerage director for Pinney Insurance Center, Inc. in Roseville, Calif. "However, this would be hard to substantiate and even harder to identify, if in fact, it had influenced the underwriting decision. This is because your typical underwriter has a series of underwriting guidelines that they must follow when making an underwriting decision."

Pinney adds that most insurance carriers follow two primary reinsurance manuals.

"The most popular are Suisse Re and Gen Re's versions of these. We have copies of both and "domestic violence" isn't listed as an underwriting criteria that can or would cause any kind of rating," Pinney says. "This leaves only the personal opinions and decision making ability of the actual underwriter to first, identify a problem; second, determine that it may lead to increased mortality; and finally, find some other "ratable" reason to increase the underwriting class or decline coverage. I don't think this is likely and to my knowledge it has never occurred with us or our clients."

Also, Pinney notes that an insurer would have to provide the applicant with a reason for the decline or reduction in health class.

"I've never had this situation come up," says Jack Dewald, chair of the LIFE Foundation, and president and owner of Agency Services, Inc., a life and health brokerage in Memphis, Tenn. "The only possible reason a history of domestic violence could become an underwriting concern is if the fallout resulted in a mortality issue such as a serious long-term injury. It would be the injury itself and not how that person sustained it."

Dewald adds that it's doubtful that a victim would admit to domestic abuse on an insurance application for fear of reprisal.

"An insurer would only be aware of domestic abuse if it showed up on the individual's medical records where the doctor indicated that he or she suspected domestic violence and called the authorities, otherwise this isn't something a life underwriter would look for," says Dewald.

History

In 1994, Charles Schumer, a former New York Representative, surveyed 16 insurance companies and learned that eight companies in the health, life and disability lines of insurance, denied policies for women who had been victims of domestic violence.

In 1995, the Boston Globe reported that nine major insurers canceled or denied coverage to women based on a history of domestic abuse.

Following reports of this practice in the media, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners issued the Unfair Discrimination Against Subjects of Abuse in Life Insurance Model Act or MDL-896 that specifically outlines prohibitions regarding unfair discrimination by life insurance professionals on the basis of abuse status.

Still, since the NAIC has no regulatory authority over business practices in the insurance industry, the states would have to adopt the model for it to become law, says Vanessa Sink, spokesperson for the NAIC.

"Each state regulates insurance individually. The act must be adopted by the state legislature for it to become state law - before it can be enforced by the state department," says Sink. "Also, a state may already have a law that covers domestic violence as a pre-existing condition or have handled the regulation in another way. The states are not required to adopt an NAIC model."

Connecticut, District of Columbia, Kentucky, Idaho, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Vermont and Wyoming do not have laws prohibiting insurance discrimination on the basis of domestic violence in the life insurance market, according to the National Network to End Domestic Violence, an advocacy group concerned with ending domestic abuse.

North Carolina introduced a statute that bans the use of domestic violence as a pre-existing medical condition in individual and group health insurance plans on March 1, 2010.

"We maintain that NCDOI does not consider domestic violence to be a pre-existing condition; it doesn't meet our statutory definition of a medical condition so it could not be considered a pre-existing condition in any policy including disability and life insurance. Our same arguments from last fall and our regulatory oversight and interpretation of North Carolina's insurance laws would not change," says Kristin Milam, a spokesperson for the North Carolina Department of Insurance.

"This practice is prohibited for specified health products and can be found in the unfair trade practice 38a-816(18). The statute applies to various types of health coverage, such as major medical, HMO coverage, hospital and medical-surgical coverage. However, the law does not apply to life insurance or disability insurance," says Connecticut Insurance Department spokesperson Dawn McDaniel. "Me or my colleagues are not aware of any complaints related to this topic."

The Vermont Department of Banking, Insurance, Securities and Health Care Administration (BISHCA), doesn't have laws in place that explicitly prohibit domestic violence discrimination in health, disability and life insurance, but Michael Bertrand, Deputy Commissioner of Insurance, says that the department does have laws that prohibit any rating practice that is discriminatory and domestic violence would fall under that prohibition.

"We have never seen an application that deals with domestic violence and if we ever saw something like that, we would never allow it," says Bertrand.

If you believe your insurance application was denied because of domestic abuse in the past, there are some steps you can take to remedy the situation.

"They should talk to the insurance regulator in their state or speak with a consumer advocate. Most departments of insurance have offices where consumers can file complaints, "said Nancy Durborow, specialist for the National Network to end Domestic Violence." Also, see what is the procedure for lodging a complaint in some states the insurance commissioner can investigate the underwriting guidelines of the companies. "

Autosave Insurance - Memphis, TN

Autosave Insurance 901-620-6388 www.yellowbook.com



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAhj3LHOP20&hl=en

"Mississippi Flyway" by Nel Rand: Book Review

Mississippi Flyway

Nel Rand

iUniverse (2005)

ISBN 0595357628

Reviewed by Cherie Fisher for Reader Views (9/06)

First time novelist Nel Rand hits a home run with "Mississippi Flyway". The book caught my attention from the first page and kept it right through to the last page. It is rich with Southern culture and adventures along the Mississippi Flyway (the path along the Mississippi River that birds fly each season). I honestly felt like I was part of the adventure riding in the Bunny Bread truck with Ellie Moon and her Dad, the not so "Tiny" Moon. I also completely related to Ellie's early life as a young Catholic child brought up on a diet of good ole' Catholic guilt!

The story begins with scenes from Ellie's childhood and the traumatic experiences she endures that eventually lead to repressed memories. Ellie's early experiences, full of abuse, addiction and the early death of her sister Rose, set her up for a lonely and empty life as an adult.

Move forward to Saint Louis in 1967 where Ellie is an unemployed, recently divorced 31 year old still being incessantly nagged by her mother and you have a woman who is definitely ripe for an adventure. That's where her wanderer father, a notorious gambler and conman, walks in after 20 years and offers to take Ellie on a road trip. She quickly accepts and begins the adventure of a lifetime.

The adventures for Ellie happen on two levels - the trip where her father is being pursued by the nasty piece of work Sheriff Dover and the internal struggles that she has with her subconscious to remember what happened to her as a child. I experienced a real sense of the South as it was in 1967 as Ellie and Tiny are pursued by Dover to Kentucky and gambling at Miss Ludine's, onto the backwaters of the Mississippi to an illegal moonshine distillery, to the wild eating contest in colorful Memphis, concluding with a Voodoo ceremony in New Orleans. All through this, Ellie is struggling with her feelings about Tiny's abandonment when she was a child, her sister Rose's death 10 years earlier and the memories that are starting to resurface. She realizes that it's okay to let them out now because she is strong enough to deal with it, and that she must face them to move on with her life. "Mississippi Flyway" ends with Ellie learning just how much compassion and forgiveness she is capable of.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and highly recommend it to anyone looking for a great weekend read. But be forewarned, don't pick this up before bedtime and expect to go to sleep early.