A Howard Watson Intrigue

“Others are on their way,” she said. “They will come armed with revenge. My little brother’s death will not go unnoticed...not by you or the venomous terrorizers who keep fighting over rocks they call precious. Precious to whom? Not my people. They will come, just like me. This is in no way over. The diamond owners and intermediaries must end their hold over our children and my country. Five deaths for my brother - that is still not enough. Do what you want with me...it does not matter.   My brother will not come back from the grave.” The above is an excerpt from my third book called The Lie . It is the third installment in the “Howard Watson Intrigue” series. It is also a quick and compelling view of the diamond wars from the victims’ perspective. Unless you have been living under a rock lately you have heard people mention the video that has gone viral on Joseph Kony, the head of the Lord’s Resistance Party, a Ugandan guerilla group seemingly bent on ridding its country of its...

Haymarket Center is a comprehensive alcohol and substance abuse treatment center located in the West Loop . Each year since 1986 Haymarket has held a summer festival thanking the staff and volunteers for the tremendous work they do. Haymarket supplies FREE food, rides, animals, arcades, photographers, etc. to all who come to the Festival (mostly staff, their family members and donors). Alderman Walter Burnett’s office has consistently assisted in blocking off several streets for this fun event. For the past two years the State and Federal government has cut our substance abuse budget by 68%, leaving us with no choice but to help with the costs of the Festival. Last year we held a stair climbing event where the participant had to climb 676 stairs as many times as he/she could in our three buildings. We had 16 staff members, one District firefighter, two kids and several volunteers as climbers. We raised $1,684.00 in sponsorship donations. This year we hope to triple our climbers and ...

I remember when I felt the lump in my breast. It felt huge. I would like to say I was calm, but I can’t.   I…freaked…out.   At the time I had two little kids (three, counting my husband) and I was only 35 years old. I had just been to my doctor’s office and was told everything was fine.   My mammogram exam showed nothing significant. However, the very-next-week the lump found its way to the surface of my breast. I don’t recall what was worst - the lump or waiting days for the appointment with the surgeon who would later tell me it was “benign”. I had always been athletic, so a lump in my breast made me question what I was eating, drinking and stressing out on. It jolted me into looking at what I was eating, not how much I was eating. About 39,510 women die from cancer in the U.S. every year, with breast cancer being the most common after lung cancer. The chance of dying from breast cancer is about 1 in 36, even though breast cancer has been going down. (Research say...