Dallas City Hall

Dallas City Hall, On and off this week I tried to find out who was responsible for the bike-safety flier you see below, which was posted to the Dallas Police Department’s website at some point last week. City Hall said, “Not us”; the DPD echoed, “Not us.” (We never did hear from Max Kalhammer the city’s bike coordinator, for whom many messages have been left.) No matter: It was removed from the site in the last couple of days.

The reason: “DPD took it down at the request of City Hall,” says Lt. Paul Stokes, a Dallas police spokesperson. “We are redesigning the flier and will repost when it’s completed.”

Dallas City Hall spokesman Frank Librio confirms that he was the one who asked for it to be removed.

“Despite the best efforts of the Dallas Police Department to provide the community with education about bike safety, there were some facts that weren’t updated,” he says. “We asked them to take it down until we could provide them with the correct information.”

Among the stats in need of updating, says Librio: the bit about there being 90 miles’ worth of “shared bike lanes.” Not even close.

At some point, the city council is supposed to be briefed about how the Dallas police will enforce the city’s new bicycle ordinance. No one seems to know when, though.

Wholistic Herbs Recall Non-sterile

Wholistic Herbs Recall Non-sterile, Wholistic Herbs Inc. of Dallas, TX, is recalling all quantities of its 1-fluid-ounce Koff and Kold and Kold Sore spray products distributed from March 2009 through February 2012. Products intended for use in the eye that are non-sterile have the potential to cause eye infections, which may be sight threatening. Also, nasal solutions that are not sterile could lead to a respiratory infection.

The recall was the result of a routine FDA inspection that identified several labeling issues. These products are not tested properly as to assure their safety.

Wholistic Herbs, Inc. Koff & Kold spray with herbal extract as the product is not sterile and is intended to be sprayed into the nose and throat for treatment of colds, flu, cough, stuffy nose, and sinus infection.

Wholistic Herbs, Inc. Kold Sore spray with liquid sea mineral as the product is not sterile and is intended to be sprayed into the eyes for the treatment of dry eye and pink eye. The product is also intended to be sprayed into the nose for sinus allergy by pollen, and onto the lips and genitals for the treatment of fever blisters, shingles and herpes simplex.

Koff & Kold and Kold Sore were distributed throughout the Unites States to retail stores located in Texas, California, Washington, Virginia, New Jersey, New York, Maryland, Illinois, Georgia, Nevada, Arizona, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Florida. The products were also distributed through acupuncture clinics and the firm’s website at www.naturalapothecary.com.

Koff & Kold and Kold Sore are packaged in white plastic 1-fluid-ounce spray bottles that contain a product insert inside of the clear plastic lid. The product insert provides usage instructions to customers. The products are identified with a “use by” date on the bottom of the bottle. All used by dates are being recalled.

February 2012 Pharmaceutical Recalls

February 2012 Pharmaceutical Recalls, Glenmark Pharmaceuticals on Saturday said it has issued a voluntary nationwide recall in the US for seven lots of its oral contraceptive Norgestimate and Ethinyl Estradiol tablets due to a packaging error.

The recall is issued by the company’s US arm Glenmark Generics Inc for tablets in strengths of 0.18 mg/0.035 mg, 0.215 mg/0.035 mg, 0.25 mg/0.035 mg, Glenmark Pharma said in a statement.

“The recall is being implemented because of a packaging error, where select blisters were rotated 180 degrees within the card, reversing the weekly tablet orientation and making the lot number and expiry date visible only on the outer pouch,” it added.

As a result of the error the daily regimen for these oral contraceptives could leave women consumers in US at risk for unintended pregnancy, the company said.

It, however, did not mention the financial implications of the recall exercise.

The tablets are manufactured and packaged by Glenmark Generics Ltd India and are distributed by Glenamrk Generics Inc only in US, it added.

The company said it discovered the error when it received a complaint from a consumer stating that she received one blister pack in which the tablets were packaged in reverse order and it immediately decided to recall the affected packs.

“At this time, there remains sufficient supply of unaffected lots of material in the marketplace to support demand, Glenmark said.

Liquid Paper Inventor

Liquid Paper Inventor, Bette Claire Graham (23 March 1924 – 12 May 1980) was an American typist, commercial artist, the inventor of Liquid Paper, and mother of musician and producer Michael Nesmith.
Graham was born Bette Claire McMurray in Dallas, Texas to Jesse McMurray, an automotive supply company manager, and Christine Duval.

She was raised in San Antonio and graduated from Alamo Heights High School. She married Warren Audrey Nesmith (1919-1984) before he left to fight in World War II, but they divorced in 1946. To support herself as a single mother, she worked as a secretary at Texas Bank and Trust, a bank in Texas. She eventually attained the position of the executive secretary, the highest position open at that time to women in the industry.

It was very difficult to erase mistakes made by early electric typewriters, which caused problems for Graham. In order to make extra money she used her talent painting holiday windows at the bank. She realized, as she said, “with lettering, an artist never corrects by erasing, but always paints over the error. So I decided to use what artists use. I put some tempera water-based paint in a bottle and took my watercolor brush to the office. I used that to correct my mistakes.”

Graham secretly used her white correction paint for five years, making some improvements with help from her son’s chemistry teacher at Thomas Jefferson High School in Dallas. Some bosses admonished her against using it, but coworkers frequently sought her “paint out.” She eventually began marketing her typewriter correction fluid as “Mistake Out” in 1956. The name was later changed to Liquid Paper when she began her own company.

In 1962 Bette Nesmith married Robert Graham, who joined her in running the company.

In 1979 she sold Liquid Paper to the Gillette Corporation for USD $47.5 million. At the time, her company employed 200 people and made 25 million bottles of Liquid Paper per year.