Green - what a beautiful color!  It is St. Patrick's Day and everyone is searching their closets for something green (that fits) to wear today so as to avoid the pinching by classmates and co-workers.  It's mid-March and the weather forecast for Lincoln, Nebraska is 75 degrees and sunny - the trees and grass will surely be "greening up" for Spring.  It's been a long winter in Nebraska and we  welcome any shades of green on the landscape.  And that means we can soon expect an abundance of those green foods that I love - broccoli, asparagus, bell peppers, spinach and green beans.  And my favorite source of green and my absolute favorite beverage - a Starbucks green tea latte (hold the syrup - just milk and matcha powder).  Green is beautiful and delicious.....except in my line of work (infection prevention and control).  In my business, we try to avoid the wearin' of the green (pus)- it usually indicates an infection when a wound or a cut turns green.  The color is created by the breakdown of bacteria by white blood cells as they digest the foreign proteins in a process called "phagocytosis".   Additionally, in a discussion of green and microbes - Pseudomonas aeruginosa comes to mind.  That water-loving bacterium appears green under the microscope.   So, today I have mixed feelings about "the wearin' of green".   My advice? Wear it only in good health and you can experience the associated good luck. 

Send a free St. Patrick's Day e-card featuring the nanobugs today.

On the weekend I read with great interest a short biography of Theodor Geisel and visited the Dr. Seuss website. I was touched by the unique contributions he made to children AND adults in his lifetime. His pen name - Dr. Seuss - came from his mother’s maiden name of Seuss.  When he was alive and living in La Jolla, California, a stream of 20, 000 birthday greetings would arrive on his birthday from children and adults wanting to recognize his books and the contibutions he made to society with his writing (46 books)  and drawing.  A couple of things about his life I think are worth mentioning today as they caused me to contemplate in new ways - my career, the current economy and the needs of people in the global community. 

Geisel’s father was to be named president of the brewery where he worked in Springfield, Massachusetts on the day Prohibition was declared.  His father made a career change to became a part-time zookeeper and parks superintendent.  Giesel liked to go with his father to the zoo and to draw the animals he saw there.  He continued to doodle and even drew cartoons for the college magazine while he attended Dartmouth – studying to be a professor.  He attended Oxford for a while and traveled throughout Europe before returning to the USA in search of work.  He drew cartoons for advertisements and wrote copy for some ads.  One of his ad campaigns was called “Quick, Henry!  The Flit!”  His drawing showed a person being attacked by giant insects.  He did well at advertising creating ads for Standard Oil and many others but did not enjoy it.  He began to write books for children in his spare time and suffered through countless rejections of his work.  Finally, in 1937, a friend published for him the book, And to Think That I Saw It On Mulberry Street.  Several years later, the US was at war. Too old for the draft, but wanting to contribute to the war effort, so he served with Frank Capra's Signal Corps (U.S. Army) making training films. It was here that he was introduced to the art of animation and developed a series of animated training films featuring a trainee called Private Snafu.  With serious issues related to the war, Geisel was able to get and keep the attention of his audiences with humor and funny pictures. 

We are all familiar with the Dr. Seuss classics: The Cat in the Hat, Green Eggs and Ham, and Horton Hatches an Egg, and If I Ran the Zoo (a childhood dream of his) which he wrote to battle illiteracy in his time.  But Dr. Seuss also addressed controversial subjects with his books:  The Butter Battle Book (the nuclear arms race), Horton Hears a Who (reflecting on his visit to Hiroshima, Japan after WWII) and The Lorax ( a statement on ecology and the logging industry – banned in some communities), and You are Only Old Once (a book for aging adults on the trials of seeing doctors). 

I think the life of Theodor Geisel reinforces some important points: #1- that sometimes "silly" is good and humor can be an effective tool to teach boring or difficult topics (like prevention of sexually transmitted infections).  #2 in tough economic times of war, depressions and recessions, there is often a place for uniquely creative educators and their teaching tools (like the nanobugs). 

My silly hat goes off today to the memory of Dr. Seuss and the books that make reading to my grandchildren so fun.  (Our favorite is Go, Dog, Go - especially the "Dog Party" near the end)