Hey, students: Don’t take the nanobugs back to school with you instead, wear them on your T-shirt.  During August and September, if you buy a nanobugs t-shirt in the online store, you get a second one free!  We will send it automatically with your order.  And if you want the second shirt to be a different size from the first, just fill in your name and the size in "contact us".   

Hey, teachers: Get the school year off to an healthy start. Teach your students proper cough and sneeze etiquette with the help of the nanobugs Training Shirt.

Hey, lunch ladies: Wear a nanobugs apron to remind students and co-workers of the importance of preventing foodborne illness .  For each apron you order in August and September in the online store, we will send another one to you free.   

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• Wet your hands with warm, running water and then apply liquid soap, or use a clean bar of soap and lather well.
• Rub your hands together vigorously for at least 15 seconds (slowly sing the Happy Birthday song to estimate the time needed to scrub) lathering all surfaces, including the backs of your hands, wrists, between your fingers and under your fingernails.
• Rinse well from wrists down to fingertips.  Don’t shake and flip water around after rinsing – this seems to be a natural response much like a dog shaking from head to toes when it gets wet. Resist the temptation.
• Dry your hands with a clean towel. In a public restroom, leave the water running while you dry your hands with a paper towel and then use the towel to turn off the faucet.  (Faucet handles are often heavily contaminated in public restrooms so you don’t want to touch them again  with your clean hands)

• Apply the hand sanitizer to the palm of your hand and rub your hands together, covering all surfaces of your hands, until they are dry.

Today we celebrate the 40^th Earth Day!   I am wearing my Earth Day tee-shirt that says, ”Earth Day- Celebrate Everyday”. I planted some flowers in the planter in the front yard this morning and I plan to continue the celebration on Saturday with more transplanting and yard primping. I want to take this opportunity to recognize the millions of nanobugs that inhabit the soil and promote decay and enrichment of the soil. I think most humans forget the positive contribution that microbes make to the cycles of life outdoors.  I hope you can get your hands in the soil today and participate in tending the Earth. (Be sure to wash those hands when you are finished)  Today go beyond your appreciation of the beautiful blooming trees and flowers - and appreciate the often-forgotten microbes that support The Earth and her vegetation. Go,nanobugs!

Spring is here and our leisure time now includes more outdoor activities.  Cooking meat and vegetables on an outdoor grill is a cherished activity of many American families.  It is good for our health and seems to be effective in bringing families together for meals around the picnic table as well as the kitchen table.  But food safety is an important goal with outdoor grilling as well as indoor cooking.   The warm weather outdoors presents some added challenges related to cooking outdoors.  There are some foodborne nanobugs that can spoil the fun if they are allowed to go unchecked in our food preparation process especially in the warm weather months.  The major culprits are:  E. coli O157:H7, Salmonella enteritidis, Campylobacter jejuni and Norovirus.  Let’s look at the topic of food safety with outdoor cooking and grilling in weekly segments and then I will offer some additional tips throughout the Summer.       

Grilling is a food preparation process which begins at the grocery store.  Make the grocery shopping your last stop because meat and poultry should not be out of controlled refrigeration more than 2 hours normally and less than one hour when the temperatures outside are above 90 degrees F.  If meat and poultry are unrefrigerated too long bacteria grow rapidly.  Some bacteria produce toxins that can cause illness even when the food is finally cooked.  When shopping, collect meat and poultry last and non-perishables first.  Many grocery stores are designed with a layout that facilitates this order to shopping.  Purchase ground meat and poultry no more than one or 2 days before you grill it.  Otherwise freeze the items.  Grill larger cuts of meat such as steaks within 4 days of purchase or freeze them.  Don’t put your perishables in the trunk of the car to transport home.  The temperature inside the trunk is too hot in the summer and bacteria will grow rapidly.  I keep a cooler in my trunk during the Spring and Summer months in which to protect frozen and cold foods during the trip home from the grocery store.  Refrigerate meat and poultry immediately upon arrival at home.  In the refrigerator, place meat and poultry on the bottom shelf to prevent cross-contamination from meat juices escaping from the packaging and dripping on raw food items below.  The refrigerator should be maintained at 40 degrees F. 

Stay focused and intend to be….infection-free!

Today is Maggie Mae’s first birthday!  Maggie is not a nanobug and not a cartoon – she is my real live Beagle puppy.  I discovered that 2010 also includes the celebration of the 60^th birthday of a more famous Beagle – Snoopy.  Snoopy is the most wonderful cartoon character created by Charles Schultz in his comic strip- Peanuts.  Wikipedia sites October 4, 1950 as Snoopy’s cartoon birth date (when he first appeared in the cartoon).  Evidently, Schultz wanted to call the dog “Sniffy” but that name was already assigned to another dog in another comic strip.  He settled on the infamous name of “Snoopy” – his late mother’s idea to name their next dog.  It is an affectionate term in Norwegian. It’s hard to imagine the dog we know as Snoopy with any other name – but as comedian, Dave Barry says, “a Beagle is just a nose with four legs”.  I would have to agree on that and suggest that all Beagles be assigned a middle name of Sniffy.

Personification with characterization – especially in a novel cartoon format - is such an effective tool for entertaining and educating if the characterization is accurate. This is the basis for the development of the nanobugs: cartoon microbes that entertain and educate people of all ages about practical microbiology.  Cartoonists gave a voice to their characters with “thought balloons” or “speech bubbles”.  We have gone a step further and animated the nanobugs giving them a characteristic statement (one-liner) to reinforce their activity/behavior – whether it is positive or negative in relation to human health.

Happy Birthday to Maggie Mae.….and many more! 

Take a minute (or 10) today and reminisce about Snoopy via Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snoopy.  I guarantee you will be smiling.