Be on the lookout for these colorful posters hanging around town! The Fearless campaign was conceived by the Marke ng Team (Jus n Azzarella, Theresa Woeh-rel, Lindsay Zasada and John Carocci) as a way to pro-mote this year’s Pride Fes val, which will feature an expanded schedule of exci ng events. Watch for more informa on in future issues of Connec ons, or visit the Pride website at Buff aloPrideFes val.com.

Worst date ever – fi rst date with my husband. He showed up late. Told me his ba ery died out in front of my house and he only had enough money for our date. So I had to use my Sears charge card to buy him a new bat-tery (and I’ve been using my charge cards for him to this day).

— Lucille Venezia

My worst date experience was when I was heading out with a boyfriend for a Valen ne’s Day dinner, and we decided to stop at a cor-ner store so that he could get himself a pack of cigare es. I walked over to the cooler to get a soda, and a guy who was ge ng a beer at the cooler said something disrespec ul to me. I began to go off on him saying, “my man is in here so you had be er watch your mouth”. I looked over at him and saw that my date was pretending to read the New York Times and ac ng as if he totally did not hear what was going on and did not make an at-tempt to protect me. So I told him, “this date is over!”, and told him to take me home.

– Elisa Luciano

A nice guy asked me out. We decided to go to a movie at 7:00 p.m. All showings were sold out, and reluctantly we bought the 11:00 p.m. show. This le 4½ hours to fi ll! We went to a

restaurant to eat, and a er wai ng an hour for a table we ordered our food. We started the dreaded “small talk” and then realized it had been almost half an hour since we had even seen our server. We fi nally fl agged her down and she said, “Ooops! I forgot to put your order in!” I lost it and yelled at her and we stormed out. When we got back into the car, my date ran over a bo le! (No fl at re, thank goodness!) We drove around and fi -nally se led on a drive through… the line was incredibly long, but we were so hungry we didn’t care. We ordered our food, and moved up a li le. We then began to have a great con-versa on, but again we weren’t moving!! To make ma ers worse, a number of cars had pulled in behind us so we were stuck! Fast-forward another hour. We arrive at the win-dow to pay and the cashier says, “We’re ou a chicken sandwiches. Do you want a burger instead?” Neither of us ate beef. We drove off angry, hungry, and completely late for our movie. We then drove back to the theater, fi lled out the “refund paperwork” and ended up ea ng his roommate’s cold spaghe that was le over from a roman c dinner he’d planned for his girlfriend. What a disaster! 18 years later we s ll laugh about it… that nice guy is now my husband.

– Maisha Drayton

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GEEK SPEAKOur lives are almost completely dominated by email, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Email can be a tool that enables you to get more done, rather than a re-lentless wave that washes both me and produc v-ity away. Outlook is your friend. For advanced users, these Outlook ps will allow you to purge ineffi ciency and make the most of your me.

Quickly A ach Files in Outlook A aching a fi le to an email message can be a fi ddly process, but you can streamline it and make sure you don’t forget the at-tachment by using Outlook’s fi ling system. Browse to the fi le you want to a ach to a message and open Outlook at your inbox. Click and drag the fi le from its folder onto the inbox shown in your mail folders in Outlook. This creates a new message and a aches the fi le in one ac on. Now address it and add a cover note.

Use Quick Parts Find yourself typing the same emails over and over? Quick Parts are blocks of content you can include in messages. They’re a lot like Auto Text, but can include links and pictures, as well as text messages. To create a new Quick Part, start an email message and enter the content you want to include. Select it and choose ‘Insert | Quick Parts | Save Selec- on to Quick Part Gallery’. Provide a name, category

and descrip on, and click ‘OK’. Whenever you want to use this block of content, choose ‘Insert | Quick Parts’ and select it from the list. You’ll see a preview for each Quick Part you have stored.

Disable Message Alerts Incoming email can be a huge distrac on, especially when you need to get some se-

rious work done. However, if you close Outlook, you won’t benefi t from task and appointment reminders. Make sure you s ck to your email schedule by dis-abling new message alerts, then se ng a reminder to check your email at the correct me. To disable email alerts, choose ‘Tools | Op ons | Email Op ons | Ad-vanced Email Op ons’. Now clear each of the check-boxes below the sec on marked ‘When New Items Ar-rive in my Inbox’ and click ‘OK’ three mes to confi rm. Make sure you set an appointment to check your in-box, though, or you might miss an important message.

Get Organized with Categories Use Outlook categories to help iden fy items that are important to you. By assigning colors to categories, you can quickly see what diff erent messages, appoint-ments and tasks relate to. To sort your categories, click the ‘Categorize’ bu on on the toolbar – it’s next to the fl ag and shows four colored squares. Choose ‘All Cat-egories’ and rename the exis ng ones to labels you need. You can change colors, add new categories and set shortcut keys for each category here. To add an item to a category, select it and press the shortcut key.

Rename Old Emails Quite o en, the subject line of an email bears li le resemblance to its contents, es-pecially if it’s part of a longer thread that may have started with a message simply en tled ‘How are you?’ You can apply retroac ve fi ling to important messages by renaming their subjects to make them easier to fi nd. Open the email in a new window and click in the subject line. Delete the old subject and type the new one in. Click ‘Yes’ to confi rm the change.

THIS MONTH: PUT OUTLOOK TO WORK FOR YOU!by Patrick Butler

O5 February Birthdays Kelly Kenyon – February 3

Damian Mar nez – February 9Eric San ago – February 14

Stephanie Vroman-Goodrich – February 14Frank Goldberg – February 16

Ann Licata – February 19Karen Edmond – February 22

Sheila Marcheson – February 22Victoria Deleon – February 26

February AnniversariesMargie Hunter - 1 yearKelly Kenyon – 1 year

Dana McKnight – 1 yearRicardo Nazario – 1 year

Eric San ago – 1 yearShannon Bryant – 2 years

Saw Min – 2 yearsNicole D’Addario – 3 years

Kim Harding – 3 yearsJames Hill – 3 years

Yakira Moreno-Soto – 3 yearsJacob Perrello – 3 yearsJulie Vaughan – 3 years

Joshua McClain – 4 yearsCarrie Sentz – 4 years

Jerome Robinson – 5 yearsCrystal White – 5 yearsJohn Carocci – 19 years

Your Con nued Dedica on and HardWork Are No ced and Appreciated!

CONNECTIONS CONTRIBUTORSPUBLISHER/LAYOUT JOHN CAROCCI

EDITOR KIMBERLY HARDINGCONTRIBUTORS MAISHA DRAYTON, SHEILA

MARCHESON, BRENDAN ORRANGE, PATRICK BUTLER

fi verandomfactsoneisalie!C A N YO U T E L L T H E D I F F E R E N C E ?

(see back cover for answer)

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2

3

4

5

S U B M I T T E D B Y B R E N D A N O R R A N G E

The average human brain hasabout 100 billion nerve cells.

Nerve impulses to and from the brain travelas fast as 170 miles per hour. They can alsotravel as slow as 2 miles per hour.

Humans produce about 10,000gallons of saliva in a life me.

The average adult heart beats 72 mesa minute; 100,000 mes a day; 3,600,000 mesa year; and 2.5 billion mes during a life me.

Your intes nes can wrap around the equator.

New Kids on the Block in 2010 and 2012!!! – Mindi Mietlicki

It’s a toss-up between Billy Talent and Say Anything; I saw both last year. Amazing. – Ashlee Rudolph

Keith Sweat, with Boys to Men. —Elisa Luciano

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Live @ the Aud in 1990. I sat in the fi rst row and gave a high-fi ve to Raphael. I didn’t wash my hand for a week, much to the dismay of my mother. —Patrick Butler

When I was 10 I a ended my fi rst concert with my mom—Puff Daddy and the Family (all about the Benjamins what) best concert ever!! – Shannon Bryant

The best concert I’ve ever a ended was last month: Alexisonfi re farewell show on New Year’s Eve in their hometown of Hamilton, Ontario. The crowd surfi ng was ridiculous. – Lindsay Zasada

1969 (I think). Rolling Stones, sold out at Bills Stadium. — Lucille Venezia

Megaton Mundial was the best concert I have a ended (also the only one— LOL). It was the biggest concert in the Hispanic Community. There were 18 stars/singers and more than 40,000 people. The concert started at 3:00 p.m. and we didn’t leave ‘ l midnight. – Johanna Aponte

A friend who works for NBC sent me a promo CD with a note: “I think you’ll like this.” It instantly became one of my favorite albums. A few weeks later, I saw an ad in Artvoice – Kate Jacobs, my new favorite singer, was coming to the Calumet. When I showed up, I was the only person there, and Kate called me over to sit with her and the band. We talked about music (and life) for over an hour, then she and the band performed their set. – John Carocci

How much do you really know about your co-workers here at Evergreen Health Services? Read 10 Fun Facts to learn all the juicy details! If you’d like to be featured in a future issue, write down 10 fun facts about yourself and send them to either Kimberly Harding or John Carocci. There are only three rules: there have to be ten, they have to be fun, and they have to be facts!

Aaron Pry1. Wrestled an alligator in Everglades.

2. Got 5 s tches on Christmas when

I was 5 years old.

3. Was born on Friday the 13th.

4. Irish twins with my sister (11 months apart).

5. Played 2 college sports (Basketball

and soccer).

6. Received the Army Commenda on

Medal for 24 months of service for

OEF/OIF (Opera on Enduring

Freedom/Opera on Iraqi Freedom).

7. Have lived in 9 diff erent states.

8. I have 4 ta oos that I got in

4 diff erent states.

9. Been to 9 diff erent countries.

10. Been in Army for 11 years,

9 more ‘ l re rement!!!!

Lindsay Zasada1. I’m a classically trained violinist and

have been playing for over 20 years.

2. I love the smell of skunks.

3. I’ve studied Zoology, and wanted

to be an octopus expert.

4. In my spare me I work for a local movie

studio as a photographer and graphic

designer, and I’ve helped produce and

direct three short fi lms and one

full length feature.

5. I sing in a band with another staff member

called ‘The Charm School Dropouts’.

6. I just became an aunt for the fi rst me.

7. My favorite author is Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

and I have two Vonnegut themed ta oos.

8. I have a zoo at my house: a ki y, a

bunny, two Russian tortoises

and a red eared slider turtle.

9. My favorite television show is Doctor Who.

10. I think bow es are cool.

Many of you may not know that my experience as an art therapist with this agency goes back more years than I’m willing to admit out loud. Aft er I graduated from Buff alo State College with a Master’s Degree in Art Th erapy and became a Registered Art Th erapist, I had a number of opportunities to volunteer with AIDS Community Services doing art therapy groups. Th roughout my career I have worked as an Art Th era-pist in a variety of sett ings including general psychia-try, addictions medicine and geriatrics. I worked pri-marily in inpatient sett ings, but also in a couple of day programs not unlike the Wellness Center. In my new position in the Wellness Center, my goal is to raise awareness of the benefi ts of art therapy and integrate art therapy experiences throughout our agency’s services. Th e American Art Th erapy Association defi nes Art Th erapy as a mental health profession that uses

the creative process to improve and enhance the physical, mental and emotional well-being of indi-viduals of all ages. It is based on the belief that the creative process involved in artistic self-expression helps people resolve confl icts and problems, develop interpersonal skills, manage behavior, reduce stress, increase self esteem and self awareness and achieve insight. Art Th erapy integrates the fi elds of human development, visual art and the creative process with models of counseling and psychotherapy. I will be utilizing two approaches that are inte-gral to art therapy. Small groups will employ an art psychotherapy approach where the art created is ex-plored and discussed as a refl ection of the inner self with the goal of gaining personal insight. In larger groups, the creative process itself is the therapeutic venue and is rooted in the belief that making art has inherent healing power.

In addition to the groups originating with the Wellness Center, my aim is to partner with existing support groups throughout Evergreen Health Ser-vices. In this sett ing I will be co-facilitating (guest facilitating) these groups and off ering art therapy as an adjunct to the support group experience. It is my hope that the art therapy program will also serves as a resource for those artistic or creative clients who lack the means to support their own cre-ative eff orts. In addition to accessing materials, this may include visits to local galleries and museums and contact with local artists. I also plan to make use of public spaces throughout our agency to promote the art therapy program and the creative eff orts of our cli-ents. I am excited to be engaged in this new endeavor of off ering our clients the opportunity to give form to their ideas, feelings and experiences. I welcome any feedback you may have.

by Laura Pasquarella

M y stomach sank when I saw that number on the scale. I had deliberately avoided weighing myself for probably a year. At

that moment, in bold digital wri ng, all my worst fears were being personifi ed in that terrible num-ber. I was fat. Enough was enough. I contacted Human Resources to see what was available to me for help. I was told that our Employee Assistance Program (EAP) off ers a free, confi den al nutri on consulta on service. I immediately called to set up an appointment. The Registered Die an was wonderful! She asked me to explain my goals. Was I there to lose weight? Was I there to maintain my current status? Were health issues involved? I told her about my recent epiphany, and she began to ask about my ea ng habits, triggers for overea ng, and my “weaknesses”. The en re session took about an hour, and by the end I knew what, when, and how I should be ea ng. I had a food diary, and the empowering realiza on that I could do this! It was the fi rst step of my 30 pound weight loss journey.

That was three years ago, and I have accessed the benefi t again. I’ve maintained the weight loss; however, diabetes is prevalent within my family. When my health care provider told me I was a few steps away from being pre-diabe c, I knew what I had to do. I set up another appointment, and this me explained that it was about avoiding diabetes

more than losing weight (even though it wouldn’t hurt!) It was another fantas c session! I learned about foods that help boost my insulin response and those detrimental to my cause. I le this ses-sion with educa onal materials specifi c to diabetes preven on and again, the feeling that I can do this! If you need help making healthy food choices or even need a road map to be er ea ng, I suggest you give EAP a call. It worked for me! The mission of our EAP is to help employees, employees’ fami-lies, and employers to cope more eff ec vely with personal, family, environmental, social, and health-related stressors which they may encounter in their homes, in the workplace, and/or in the community.

February’s Five Fun Facts Answer:Number Five is a Lie!